Bucks and Montgomery County manufacturers are meeting Wednesday morning to talk about a key issue - after years of declines in manufacturing employment, they are facing looming shortages of highly skilled workers.
"It's a huge problem," said Lisa Christman, senior human resources director at the K'nex toy manufacturing company in Hatfield and one of the organizers of Wednesday's meeting.
Christman doesn't have to walk far from her office at K'nex to the factory floor, where injection molding machines spit out the brightly colored rods and connectors that combine to create construction-toy roller coasters and Ferris wheels.
From her vantage point, she can see some of her company's most important employees - the 18 toolmakers who create the molds that are the heart of the operation.
A third of them, she said, are within 10 years of retirement. Experienced toolmakers are hard to find and "a toolmaker takes 10 years to become proficient."
"We're not the only ones" worried about a skills gap. There are also shortages, she said, in people trained to be machinists and setup technicians.
So eager are the area's manufacturers to address the issue of a looming shortage of skilled manufacturing employees that they are forming their own grassroots group - the Bux-Mont Manufacturing Consortium. The Wednesday meeting, to be at the North Montco Technical Career Center in Lansdale, is its second.
On the agenda are discussions of how to engage trade schools in the region to build a talent pipeline and a review of existing training funding and availability through government workforce investment boards and community colleges.
The group was just beginning to galvanize last spring when the Middle Bucks Institute of Technology announced that it would close its precision machining program. Enrollment had dwindled to five students.
Local manufacturers rallied, unsuccessfully, to keep the program open.
In the fall, the Bucks County Workforce Investment Board chose the school to host a manufacturing job fair. Nearly every manufacturer that set up a table at the event was looking for a machinist.
Some said that they would hire a machinist even without an immediate opening, just to get them on the payroll.
K'nex toolmakers earn between $18 and $30 an hour, and must work 55 hours weekly. Even the lowest paid earns more than $1,100 a week with overtime.
"What we have to do is make sure that manufacturing jobs are attractive to parents, teachers, and students," Christman said.
Meanwhile, the fledgling consortium, through the Delaware Valley Industrial Resource Center, has already been networking to explore the possibilities of a training program aimed at teaching basic manufacturing skills such as shop math, precision measuring, and blueprint reading.
The DVIRC is a partially government-funded group set up to aid manufacturers with business issues. Last Thursday and Friday, the DVIRC organized a presentation from M.O.S.T., or Mobile Outreach Skills Training.
M.O.S.T. houses its training lab, with computer simulated welding and basic machining, in a tractor-trailer or bus, parked last week outside DVIRC's offices in the Navy Yard.
"I'm struggling to find qualified people that have good mathematics skills," said Dawn Thompson, who attended a session Thursday. She's a human resources manager at Fiber-Line Inc.
"Recruiting for the third shift is impossible," she said. She's looking for basic manufacturing workers, who will earn $13 an hour, more for the night shift. Last year, she hired 33 entry-level machine operators.
The M.O.S.T. program, run by TimeWise Management Systems in Florida, parks its training van in the employer's parking lot. It handles initial recruiting and the employer commits to hiring anyone who makes it through the two-week training period.
Half of the training is Manufacturing 101 - blueprint reading, shop math, safety, and principles of lean manufacturing. The second half is custom, with software designers from M.O.S.T creating programs to teach precisely what each individual manufacturer requires.
"I'm very interested," Thompson said.
Each truck can accommodate at least 10 students and manufacturers can share, as long as they can agree on the curriculum. The training is designed to replicate job conditions. For example, if jobs are on the overnight shift, that's when the training is done. It weeds out those who can't handle the hours.
After the two weeks, four months of on-the-job training follow, with a mentoring relationship continuing for six months. The cost is about $8,000 an employee, but director Claudia Follett told the group that government training money was sometimes available, especially for laid-off workers or veterans.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Germany's Gerresheimer targets major US plastics growth
Gerresheimer, a $1.5 billion/yr processor of glass and plastic packaging and other devices for the global pharmaceutical and medical market, is targeting major growth in the United States.
"We have established a leading position in the US market for pharmaceutical glass packaging products and we also operate in other business sections here," the company states in its 2011 financial report. "We especially aim to achieve growth in the plastic packaging sector."
Gerresheimer has been quietly ramping up a production and product development center near Atlanta, GA, and may be exploring a significant US acquisition. Officials declined to comment to Plastics Today on its American plans.
The company established a facility in Peachtree City, GA in 1993 and now operates 28 injection molding machines there in a 1,900 square meter (sqm) site with 800 sqm for ISO class 8 clean-room production and 800 sqm of controlled areas. The facility has been beefed up significantly in the past two years.
Customized inhalers, cuvettes, test cards for microbiological test systems and disposables for invasive systems are produced there. The facility is certified to DIN EN ISO 9001:2008 and DIN EN ISO 13485:2003 and has its own moldmaking department, a mold trial area with injection molding machines, and multi-functional laboratories. The facility includes state-of-the-art systems such as turning stack mold technology for inhaler production.
Gerresheimer already is a dominant player in North America for medical glassware products, operating 11 plants in the United States and Mexico. "An attractive market with good prospects: North America is where we can effectively build on our leading position," the company states in its annual report.
Specific factors making the United States an attractive market include the presence of many leading pharmaceutical companies, significant GDP, an aging population and healthcare reform that will provide access to health insurance to 32 million people who were previously uninsured.
Gerresheimer has 10,200 employees in 42 global locations, and is growing rapidly in part because of a strong cash flow and high earnings. It was reported in the German financial press last year that the company was scouting a US acquisition, but was not willing to pay high earnings multiples that are the norm in the United States. The company was seeking to acquire a processor in the U.S. with sales of between $100 million to $250 million.
Its leading competitors in plastics include Nypro, Becton Dickinson and West Pharma. Gerresheimer positions itself as number one in Europe in plastic for inhalation (dry powder inhaler) systems and packaging for drug delivery systems in Europe, and number two in plastics for diabetes diagnostics. It's just starting in the injector pen business in Europe. Its position in North America is much weaker, with a number three position in plastics systems for inhalation. Gerresheimer ranks number one in two key medical glass markets in North America.
International expansion continues to be the heart of the company's strategy, with a focus on emerging markets. In March 2011, Geresheimer acquired Brazilian pharmaceutical plastic closure molder Védat to strengthen its pharmaceutical plastic packaging business in South America. Its Medical Plastic Systems business unit is expanding rapidly in Germany and the Czech Republic. Plastics represent 23% of the company's profits. Plastics revenues are about $500 million.
On Feb. 1, Gerresheimer took over item GmbH, medical device design . The acquired company will operate as an independent subsidiary under the name of Gerresheimer item GmbH. This acquisition augments the pharmaceutical and medical product design and development capability of Gerresheimer AG's Medical Plastic Systems Division.
"We apply our concept of combining product development and manufacturing competencies at an early stage of the value chain," said Andreas Schütte, member of the Gerresheimer AG Management Board responsible for the Plastic Systems Division. "We aim to be involved in customer projects right from the initial product concept onwards."
At the beginning of 2011 Gerresheimer established the Medical Innovation Group, a team of specialists with interdisciplinary product development design and engineering competencies. A team of around 20 designers and product developers work there.
"We have established a leading position in the US market for pharmaceutical glass packaging products and we also operate in other business sections here," the company states in its 2011 financial report. "We especially aim to achieve growth in the plastic packaging sector."
Gerresheimer has been quietly ramping up a production and product development center near Atlanta, GA, and may be exploring a significant US acquisition. Officials declined to comment to Plastics Today on its American plans.
The company established a facility in Peachtree City, GA in 1993 and now operates 28 injection molding machines there in a 1,900 square meter (sqm) site with 800 sqm for ISO class 8 clean-room production and 800 sqm of controlled areas. The facility has been beefed up significantly in the past two years.
Customized inhalers, cuvettes, test cards for microbiological test systems and disposables for invasive systems are produced there. The facility is certified to DIN EN ISO 9001:2008 and DIN EN ISO 13485:2003 and has its own moldmaking department, a mold trial area with injection molding machines, and multi-functional laboratories. The facility includes state-of-the-art systems such as turning stack mold technology for inhaler production.
Gerresheimer already is a dominant player in North America for medical glassware products, operating 11 plants in the United States and Mexico. "An attractive market with good prospects: North America is where we can effectively build on our leading position," the company states in its annual report.
Specific factors making the United States an attractive market include the presence of many leading pharmaceutical companies, significant GDP, an aging population and healthcare reform that will provide access to health insurance to 32 million people who were previously uninsured.
Gerresheimer has 10,200 employees in 42 global locations, and is growing rapidly in part because of a strong cash flow and high earnings. It was reported in the German financial press last year that the company was scouting a US acquisition, but was not willing to pay high earnings multiples that are the norm in the United States. The company was seeking to acquire a processor in the U.S. with sales of between $100 million to $250 million.
Its leading competitors in plastics include Nypro, Becton Dickinson and West Pharma. Gerresheimer positions itself as number one in Europe in plastic for inhalation (dry powder inhaler) systems and packaging for drug delivery systems in Europe, and number two in plastics for diabetes diagnostics. It's just starting in the injector pen business in Europe. Its position in North America is much weaker, with a number three position in plastics systems for inhalation. Gerresheimer ranks number one in two key medical glass markets in North America.
International expansion continues to be the heart of the company's strategy, with a focus on emerging markets. In March 2011, Geresheimer acquired Brazilian pharmaceutical plastic closure molder Védat to strengthen its pharmaceutical plastic packaging business in South America. Its Medical Plastic Systems business unit is expanding rapidly in Germany and the Czech Republic. Plastics represent 23% of the company's profits. Plastics revenues are about $500 million.
On Feb. 1, Gerresheimer took over item GmbH, medical device design . The acquired company will operate as an independent subsidiary under the name of Gerresheimer item GmbH. This acquisition augments the pharmaceutical and medical product design and development capability of Gerresheimer AG's Medical Plastic Systems Division.
"We apply our concept of combining product development and manufacturing competencies at an early stage of the value chain," said Andreas Schütte, member of the Gerresheimer AG Management Board responsible for the Plastic Systems Division. "We aim to be involved in customer projects right from the initial product concept onwards."
At the beginning of 2011 Gerresheimer established the Medical Innovation Group, a team of specialists with interdisciplinary product development design and engineering competencies. A team of around 20 designers and product developers work there.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Lessons on Food and the Other From "Annie Hall"
In the 1977 classic, “Annie Hall,” Jewish Alvy Singer sits down for dinner with Annie Hall’s (Diane Keaton) WASP family. Alvy imagines that the Hall family views him as a Hasidic Jew. They have imprinted upon him their one misguided image of a Jew, regardless of what Alfie says, does, or eats.
This scene kept coming to mind when I was reading David M. Freidenreich’s “Foreigners and Their Food: Constructing Otherness in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Law.” Just as in the “Annie Hall” dinner scene, “Foreigners and Their Food” illustrates the way different religions project characteristics on the “other” in order to preserve their own sense of community or authority.
Despite its complex analysis of ancient religious prohibitions, “Foreigners and Their Food” is really about the simple act of breaking bread. In examining the laws regarding with whom we can and cannot share a challah loaf, Freidenreich seeks to answer the larger question of how we define “Us” and “Them” and, even more significantly, how we maintain this distinction over time.
Freidenreich analyzes food prohibitions regarding who is allowed to prepare and partake of our meals, a body of laws that might seem archaic to 21st Century Jews. The most orthodox and observant still adhere to the nuances of bishul akum, prohibitions on non-Jews’ involvement in cooking, but the vast majority of American Jews do not. Even among modern Jews who identify as kosher, few of us worry about the religion of the chef at Eden Wok who makes the General Tso’s chicken or the Kineret factory worker who molds the challah dough. If you refused to eat your 2nd Avenue Deli corned beef sandwich alongside a non-Jew, you’d be considered rudely insular, if not flat-out racist. Yet, these dietary restrictions were once one of the most discussed and debated issues among Jewish leaders, and they are Freidenreich’s prime focus.
The book has three separate parts to examine Jewish, Christian, and Islamic sources on foreign food restrictions. Freidenreich applies a nuanced lens for examining an array of religious scholarship, including the Mishnah, several church councils, and the different schools of legal thought within Sunni and Shia Islam. The emphasis is on the way the intellectual elite within each of these religious communities analyzed food laws to define a community identity.
I found the part on Christian sources ,“Defining Otherness,” to be the most engaging of the sections. Freidenreich shows how the early Christ-believing community, Hellenistic Jews themselves, reinterpreted the same Jewish food prohibitions to argue the illegitimacy of Judaism.
Freidenreich carefully deconstructs how Christian theologians reinterpreted food prohibition as a way “to define Judaism as the very antithesis of Christianity.” Church elders argued that kashrut restrictions were imposed upon Jews not because they were chosen by god, but because god believed they were impure and needed constraints on their fleshy, carnal desires. The fact that Christians needed no such prohibitions was a sign of their inherent purity and holiness.
Religious authority was not the only issue at stake. The implicit recognition of cooking and eating as highly social acts with potential for intermingling is what fuels many of the seemingly inane intricacies of religious food prohibitions.
This fear of inter-religious meals makes sense if you recall any 1980s teen movie or your own high school experience. Remember how the cafeteria was sharply segregated into jocks, theater geeks, and stoners who sat at separate tables? Think about how little the different cliques communicated and, as a result, understood each other. Under the foreign food prohibitions, Jews, Christians, and Muslims were like characters in “The Breakfast Club,” hermetically-sealed within their specific communities with almost no accurate knowledge of the “other.”
Conversely, through sharing each other’s foods, there is natural cultural diffusion. How many of your earliest friendships started when you traded your Warheads for Pocky sticks on the blacktop or baked brownies together at your first sleepover? Hundreds and thousands of years ago, the religious intellectual elites already recognized that eating and cooking held this social power, which, Freidenreich shows, is why they feared its potential to challenge their communal structures.
This scene kept coming to mind when I was reading David M. Freidenreich’s “Foreigners and Their Food: Constructing Otherness in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Law.” Just as in the “Annie Hall” dinner scene, “Foreigners and Their Food” illustrates the way different religions project characteristics on the “other” in order to preserve their own sense of community or authority.
Despite its complex analysis of ancient religious prohibitions, “Foreigners and Their Food” is really about the simple act of breaking bread. In examining the laws regarding with whom we can and cannot share a challah loaf, Freidenreich seeks to answer the larger question of how we define “Us” and “Them” and, even more significantly, how we maintain this distinction over time.
Freidenreich analyzes food prohibitions regarding who is allowed to prepare and partake of our meals, a body of laws that might seem archaic to 21st Century Jews. The most orthodox and observant still adhere to the nuances of bishul akum, prohibitions on non-Jews’ involvement in cooking, but the vast majority of American Jews do not. Even among modern Jews who identify as kosher, few of us worry about the religion of the chef at Eden Wok who makes the General Tso’s chicken or the Kineret factory worker who molds the challah dough. If you refused to eat your 2nd Avenue Deli corned beef sandwich alongside a non-Jew, you’d be considered rudely insular, if not flat-out racist. Yet, these dietary restrictions were once one of the most discussed and debated issues among Jewish leaders, and they are Freidenreich’s prime focus.
The book has three separate parts to examine Jewish, Christian, and Islamic sources on foreign food restrictions. Freidenreich applies a nuanced lens for examining an array of religious scholarship, including the Mishnah, several church councils, and the different schools of legal thought within Sunni and Shia Islam. The emphasis is on the way the intellectual elite within each of these religious communities analyzed food laws to define a community identity.
I found the part on Christian sources ,“Defining Otherness,” to be the most engaging of the sections. Freidenreich shows how the early Christ-believing community, Hellenistic Jews themselves, reinterpreted the same Jewish food prohibitions to argue the illegitimacy of Judaism.
Freidenreich carefully deconstructs how Christian theologians reinterpreted food prohibition as a way “to define Judaism as the very antithesis of Christianity.” Church elders argued that kashrut restrictions were imposed upon Jews not because they were chosen by god, but because god believed they were impure and needed constraints on their fleshy, carnal desires. The fact that Christians needed no such prohibitions was a sign of their inherent purity and holiness.
Religious authority was not the only issue at stake. The implicit recognition of cooking and eating as highly social acts with potential for intermingling is what fuels many of the seemingly inane intricacies of religious food prohibitions.
This fear of inter-religious meals makes sense if you recall any 1980s teen movie or your own high school experience. Remember how the cafeteria was sharply segregated into jocks, theater geeks, and stoners who sat at separate tables? Think about how little the different cliques communicated and, as a result, understood each other. Under the foreign food prohibitions, Jews, Christians, and Muslims were like characters in “The Breakfast Club,” hermetically-sealed within their specific communities with almost no accurate knowledge of the “other.”
Conversely, through sharing each other’s foods, there is natural cultural diffusion. How many of your earliest friendships started when you traded your Warheads for Pocky sticks on the blacktop or baked brownies together at your first sleepover? Hundreds and thousands of years ago, the religious intellectual elites already recognized that eating and cooking held this social power, which, Freidenreich shows, is why they feared its potential to challenge their communal structures.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Photos make slow way home in tsunami-hit Japan
In a large, bright room not far from the ocean that raged through this coastal Japanese city nearly a year ago, a handful of people with magnifying glasses pore over boxes of photographs of friends or loved ones.
The massive March 11 tsunami that levelled buildings and flattened towns along a wide swathe of northern Japan, including Ofunato, also took a more subtle toll, with hundreds of thousands of photographs lost to the churning waters.
But now these memories are slowly making their way back to their owners, thanks to the painstaking efforts of a team that cleans them of mud, dirt and oil.
“I got one photo blown up, and I was so thankful for that. I put it in a frame, and it brought tears to my eyes,” said 77-year-old resident Yoshiko Jindai, looking through boxes of photographs.
Ofunato has enlisted a team of seven part-time staffers to help sort though the over 350,000 photos that have accumulated after being brought in by police, firefighters, rescue workers and average citizens who were looking through the rubble.
In charge of cleaning and restoring the photos is paper conservator Satoko Kinno, who said her job is the second stage in the marathon of returning the photos to their owners after they are found.
“I try to remember that people found these photos in the midst of rubble, and that I have to take the baton from them. So that’s where I get my motivation,” Kinno said.
The photos are frozen once found to prevent bacteria and mold from growing on them until they can be properly cleaned and packed for display.
The facility holds the photos in its industrial-sized freezer bins until they can be dealt with. Once cleaned, they are packed into photo albums and taken around to temporary housing complexes in the hopes of finding their owners.
Other people choose to sort through boxes of photos themselves for hours on end, looking for snapshots of their lives thought lost to the forces of nature.
Some laugh and chat as they search, as if at a casual social occasion. Others grab the books and flip through quickly, almost desperately.
But even those who don't find anything are grateful for the chance to sort through albums filled with thousands of photos of children, graduations and even scenery of areas struck by the tsunami, now devastated.
“I have some photos and videos at my home, but it’s still very nice of them to do this,” said 79-year-old Kimiko Tanaka.
If somebody finds photos that might belong to another person, a member of Kinno’s team will make the rounds of temporary housing to take the memories back to them.
Thousands have made their way back to grateful owners, but many thousands more remain unclaimed – or still frozen.
Kinno vows to continue until the last photo goes home.
“I’ve really started to realise the depth and meaning that each and every photo has to it, and as such I want to do what I can to return as many photos as I can,” she added.
The massive March 11 tsunami that levelled buildings and flattened towns along a wide swathe of northern Japan, including Ofunato, also took a more subtle toll, with hundreds of thousands of photographs lost to the churning waters.
But now these memories are slowly making their way back to their owners, thanks to the painstaking efforts of a team that cleans them of mud, dirt and oil.
“I got one photo blown up, and I was so thankful for that. I put it in a frame, and it brought tears to my eyes,” said 77-year-old resident Yoshiko Jindai, looking through boxes of photographs.
Ofunato has enlisted a team of seven part-time staffers to help sort though the over 350,000 photos that have accumulated after being brought in by police, firefighters, rescue workers and average citizens who were looking through the rubble.
In charge of cleaning and restoring the photos is paper conservator Satoko Kinno, who said her job is the second stage in the marathon of returning the photos to their owners after they are found.
“I try to remember that people found these photos in the midst of rubble, and that I have to take the baton from them. So that’s where I get my motivation,” Kinno said.
The photos are frozen once found to prevent bacteria and mold from growing on them until they can be properly cleaned and packed for display.
The facility holds the photos in its industrial-sized freezer bins until they can be dealt with. Once cleaned, they are packed into photo albums and taken around to temporary housing complexes in the hopes of finding their owners.
Other people choose to sort through boxes of photos themselves for hours on end, looking for snapshots of their lives thought lost to the forces of nature.
Some laugh and chat as they search, as if at a casual social occasion. Others grab the books and flip through quickly, almost desperately.
But even those who don't find anything are grateful for the chance to sort through albums filled with thousands of photos of children, graduations and even scenery of areas struck by the tsunami, now devastated.
“I have some photos and videos at my home, but it’s still very nice of them to do this,” said 79-year-old Kimiko Tanaka.
If somebody finds photos that might belong to another person, a member of Kinno’s team will make the rounds of temporary housing to take the memories back to them.
Thousands have made their way back to grateful owners, but many thousands more remain unclaimed – or still frozen.
Kinno vows to continue until the last photo goes home.
“I’ve really started to realise the depth and meaning that each and every photo has to it, and as such I want to do what I can to return as many photos as I can,” she added.
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Work force development is more than old “tool shop” mentality
R&D/Leverage has developed into more than just a mold manufacturing company. Over the past decade, the company has transformed into a full-service plastic product developer, helping brand owners go from idea to tooling and then manufacturing. R&D/Leverage's packaging capabilities include mold manufacturing for injection PET tooling and injection blow-molds. Beyond that R&D/Leverage provides brand owners with research including retail audits, trends and color studies, ethnographic research, feasibility studies and a full range of support functions.
R&D/Leverage is far from the old-school "tool shop" or "moldmaking" mentality. With all of those out-of-the-box services the company provides to brand owners, it has to be continually thinking about its work force development, and that involves much more than just finding and keeping good moldmakers. Today's R&D/Leverage has developed its own "brand" that attracts the region's (Lee's Summit, MO) best, using today's tools of choice such as its new web site, trade show presentations and advertising along with technology, innovation and a comprehensive apprenticeship program.
The company has developed a "team-first" orientation in which company executives, including senior marketing, manufacturing and product development officials, who continually work at identifying and cultivating the next generation of talent. This process is made easier by the intrinsic appeal of the company's value proposition.
"At R&D/Leverage there has been great pride in American manufacturing since 1976," said CEO Todd Riley. "With that pride you will find innovation and work force development, working hand-in-hand to attract new employees while providing our customers advanced services and products. And we do this as a team."
Management at R&D/Leverage believes in the future of U.S. manufacturing and that attracting young people into the various areas of manufacturing is vital to the success of U.S. manufacturers. "We believe in the future of U.S. manufacturing because we see, first-and-foremost, that it is possible to attract great candidates, eager to make their mark by building a real, physical product," said Robert Schiavone, Global Marketing Director, R&D/Leverage. "There is a place for creative, energetic, passionate young people in U.S. manufacturing."
Because of the extensive range of services that R&D/Leverage provides for its customers in the consumer products market, the company requires a variety of talents and expertise in its workforce. According to Schiavone, the "curb appeal" of R&D/Leverage is the company's exciting orientation. "We are the confluence of consumer research-inspired design and world-class manufacturing," he explained. "We combine Structural Brand Development and mold manufacturing - and it's a refreshing approach that captivates young 'left-brain, right-brain' thinkers."
Schiavone told PlasticsToday that because R&D/Leverage offers a greater variety of opportunities for young people to engage in various aspects of manufacturing beyond moldmaking, the company is attractive to them. "Being unique in the industry has many benefits and attracting young talent is one of them," he added. Schiavone claims R&D/Leverage is the "first and only company to offer these combined services to the plastics industry. No one else can say that right now in this industry," adding that "it's very exciting and young high-school and college kids see it the same way."
Chris Lavery, the company's Manufacturing General Manager, agreed. "Ours is a bold, creative and disciplined methodology that serves our customers well and challenges the status quo," Lavery said. "Today's younger professionals see the appeal of a place where insights, imagination and hands-on realism meet, on a global level."
The key to sustaining this approach is attracting, nurturing and retaining the young talent to grow with the company, Lavery noted, adding that R&D/Leverage is "proactive about this process" and has developed a proprietary, formalized machinist apprenticeship program. The company's program even won a UK National Training Award in 2011. "Attractive jobs are available in companies such as ours and are a rewarding alternative to the track many youths follow," he stated. "Outreach to the regional educational community is essential in communicating the availability and appeal of such programs."
R&D/Leverage's CEO, Todd Riley, sits on the advisory board for Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas. His heart is close to that institution as he is a graduate of PSU. In addition to local colleges, the company is aligned with programs such as FIRST Robotics, Skills USA and has sponsored summer internships for years.
R&D/Leverage is far from the old-school "tool shop" or "moldmaking" mentality. With all of those out-of-the-box services the company provides to brand owners, it has to be continually thinking about its work force development, and that involves much more than just finding and keeping good moldmakers. Today's R&D/Leverage has developed its own "brand" that attracts the region's (Lee's Summit, MO) best, using today's tools of choice such as its new web site, trade show presentations and advertising along with technology, innovation and a comprehensive apprenticeship program.
The company has developed a "team-first" orientation in which company executives, including senior marketing, manufacturing and product development officials, who continually work at identifying and cultivating the next generation of talent. This process is made easier by the intrinsic appeal of the company's value proposition.
"At R&D/Leverage there has been great pride in American manufacturing since 1976," said CEO Todd Riley. "With that pride you will find innovation and work force development, working hand-in-hand to attract new employees while providing our customers advanced services and products. And we do this as a team."
Management at R&D/Leverage believes in the future of U.S. manufacturing and that attracting young people into the various areas of manufacturing is vital to the success of U.S. manufacturers. "We believe in the future of U.S. manufacturing because we see, first-and-foremost, that it is possible to attract great candidates, eager to make their mark by building a real, physical product," said Robert Schiavone, Global Marketing Director, R&D/Leverage. "There is a place for creative, energetic, passionate young people in U.S. manufacturing."
Because of the extensive range of services that R&D/Leverage provides for its customers in the consumer products market, the company requires a variety of talents and expertise in its workforce. According to Schiavone, the "curb appeal" of R&D/Leverage is the company's exciting orientation. "We are the confluence of consumer research-inspired design and world-class manufacturing," he explained. "We combine Structural Brand Development and mold manufacturing - and it's a refreshing approach that captivates young 'left-brain, right-brain' thinkers."
Schiavone told PlasticsToday that because R&D/Leverage offers a greater variety of opportunities for young people to engage in various aspects of manufacturing beyond moldmaking, the company is attractive to them. "Being unique in the industry has many benefits and attracting young talent is one of them," he added. Schiavone claims R&D/Leverage is the "first and only company to offer these combined services to the plastics industry. No one else can say that right now in this industry," adding that "it's very exciting and young high-school and college kids see it the same way."
Chris Lavery, the company's Manufacturing General Manager, agreed. "Ours is a bold, creative and disciplined methodology that serves our customers well and challenges the status quo," Lavery said. "Today's younger professionals see the appeal of a place where insights, imagination and hands-on realism meet, on a global level."
The key to sustaining this approach is attracting, nurturing and retaining the young talent to grow with the company, Lavery noted, adding that R&D/Leverage is "proactive about this process" and has developed a proprietary, formalized machinist apprenticeship program. The company's program even won a UK National Training Award in 2011. "Attractive jobs are available in companies such as ours and are a rewarding alternative to the track many youths follow," he stated. "Outreach to the regional educational community is essential in communicating the availability and appeal of such programs."
R&D/Leverage's CEO, Todd Riley, sits on the advisory board for Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas. His heart is close to that institution as he is a graduate of PSU. In addition to local colleges, the company is aligned with programs such as FIRST Robotics, Skills USA and has sponsored summer internships for years.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Ukraine Fans Default Risk in Russia Bet as Vote Molds Policy
Ukraine’s efforts to seek cheaper natural gas from Russia rather than comply with the terms of a bailout have alarmed investors, propelling the former Soviet republic’s credit risk above Argentina’s for the first time in two years.
The government is shunning the International Monetary Fund as it struggles to agree on discounted fuel imports from Russia, with whom clashes halted European gas transit twice since 2006. That’s fanned concern over its ability to meet $11.9 billion in debt costs this year, with default risk rising more than any country Bloomberg tracks except Greece in the last six months.
While Ukraine faces a widening current-account gap, slowing economic growth and limited access to global capital markets, President Viktor Yanukovych has refused to raise household gas tariffs to restart a $15.6 billion IMF aid package as support for his ruling party ebbs before October elections.
“It’s a question of willingness to pay a political price,” Ronald Schneider, who helps manage about $1 billion in emerging-market debt at Raiffeisen Kapitalanlage GmbH in Vienna, said Jan. 31 by phone. “Skepticism for Ukraine will increase” without a resumption in IMF disbursements.
The cost of insuring Ukrainian state debt against non- payment for five years using credit-default swaps rose 254 basis points in the last six months to 780 today, according to CMA, which is owned by CME Group Inc. and compiles prices from dealers in the privately-negotiated market. That compares with 768 yesterday for Argentina, which the gauge surpassed Jan. 13.
Ukraine’s CDS price fell this month after peaking at 930 basis points on Jan. 17. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.
“The improvement in Ukrainian debt spreads is a mere consequence of the risk rally we’re now seeing in the markets,” Luis Costa, an emerging-market strategist at Citigroup Inc. in London, said today by e-mail. “The macro story in Ukraine still points to very dangerous imbalances in the local economy.”
Economic growth may slow to 3.9 percent this year from about 5 percent in 2011, the government estimates, as the euro- region turmoil threatens its steel exports and cold weather curbs the grain harvest.
Pressure on the hryvnia has intensified in recent months while dwindling trust in the authorities has halted capital inflows and investment, the IMF’s Ukraine representative, Max Alier, warned former First Deputy Prime Minister Andriy Klyuev in a Jan. 31 letter, the Kommersant-Ukraine newspaper reported Feb. 13.
The hryvnia has declined to 8.0138 per U.S. dollar from 7.9550 a year ago. Ukraine’s gold and foreign-currency reserves fell $3.3 billion to $31.8 billion in 2011 as the hryvnia weakened and its current-account deficit widened to 5.5 percent of gross domestic product from 2.2 percent.
The former Soviet state’s credit-rating outlook was cut to stable from positive at Fitch Ratings in October, while Moody’s Investors Service lowered it to negative in December, citing risks to funding, liquidity and political stability. They both rate Ukraine five levels below investment grade.
The yield on the government’s Eurobond due 2016 has jumped to 8.587 percent from 6.265 percent when it was issued last June. Foreign investors have cut hryvnia-debt holdings to 4.26 billion hryvnia ($532 million) as of yesterday from 11.26 billion hryvnia last January, central bank data show.
Ukraine’s IMF loan, obtained in 2010, has been frozen since last March because the government won’t approve a one-third increase in consumer energy costs, a move the Washington-based fund has demanded to trim losses at state energy company NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy.
“We can’t burden the citizens,” Yanukovych, whose ruling Party of Regions has 14 percent backing before this year’s parliamentary vote, said Feb. 16 in comments published on his website.
Instead, he wants to wipe a third off his country’s gas bill by seeking a discount on its Russian imports to $250 per 1,000 cubic meters from the $416 average price assumed in this year’s budget. The bill came to about $12 billion last year.
While the two neighbors have been negotiating for months, no agreement has been reached. Ukrainian officials say Russia wants control of the transit pipelines OAO Gazprom uses to ship gas to Europe, a similar deal to one Belarus accepted last year.
Ukraine is unwilling to sanction the sale and Prime Minister Mykola Azarov reiterated Feb. 11 that there are no plans to join a Russia-led customs union of which Belarus is also a member.
“Russia will demand a very high price in terms of sovereignty and getting control of key economic assets,” Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said Feb. 8 by phone.
Gazprom’s press service declined to comment yesterday when asked about the negotiations with Ukraine and what the company is seeking in return for potential price discounts.
Russia, which supplies Ukraine with more than 70 percent of its gas needs, agreed to cut prices in April 2010 in exchange for a 25-year extension on its lease of the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, where it has a naval base.
The government is shunning the International Monetary Fund as it struggles to agree on discounted fuel imports from Russia, with whom clashes halted European gas transit twice since 2006. That’s fanned concern over its ability to meet $11.9 billion in debt costs this year, with default risk rising more than any country Bloomberg tracks except Greece in the last six months.
While Ukraine faces a widening current-account gap, slowing economic growth and limited access to global capital markets, President Viktor Yanukovych has refused to raise household gas tariffs to restart a $15.6 billion IMF aid package as support for his ruling party ebbs before October elections.
“It’s a question of willingness to pay a political price,” Ronald Schneider, who helps manage about $1 billion in emerging-market debt at Raiffeisen Kapitalanlage GmbH in Vienna, said Jan. 31 by phone. “Skepticism for Ukraine will increase” without a resumption in IMF disbursements.
The cost of insuring Ukrainian state debt against non- payment for five years using credit-default swaps rose 254 basis points in the last six months to 780 today, according to CMA, which is owned by CME Group Inc. and compiles prices from dealers in the privately-negotiated market. That compares with 768 yesterday for Argentina, which the gauge surpassed Jan. 13.
Ukraine’s CDS price fell this month after peaking at 930 basis points on Jan. 17. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.
“The improvement in Ukrainian debt spreads is a mere consequence of the risk rally we’re now seeing in the markets,” Luis Costa, an emerging-market strategist at Citigroup Inc. in London, said today by e-mail. “The macro story in Ukraine still points to very dangerous imbalances in the local economy.”
Economic growth may slow to 3.9 percent this year from about 5 percent in 2011, the government estimates, as the euro- region turmoil threatens its steel exports and cold weather curbs the grain harvest.
Pressure on the hryvnia has intensified in recent months while dwindling trust in the authorities has halted capital inflows and investment, the IMF’s Ukraine representative, Max Alier, warned former First Deputy Prime Minister Andriy Klyuev in a Jan. 31 letter, the Kommersant-Ukraine newspaper reported Feb. 13.
The hryvnia has declined to 8.0138 per U.S. dollar from 7.9550 a year ago. Ukraine’s gold and foreign-currency reserves fell $3.3 billion to $31.8 billion in 2011 as the hryvnia weakened and its current-account deficit widened to 5.5 percent of gross domestic product from 2.2 percent.
The former Soviet state’s credit-rating outlook was cut to stable from positive at Fitch Ratings in October, while Moody’s Investors Service lowered it to negative in December, citing risks to funding, liquidity and political stability. They both rate Ukraine five levels below investment grade.
The yield on the government’s Eurobond due 2016 has jumped to 8.587 percent from 6.265 percent when it was issued last June. Foreign investors have cut hryvnia-debt holdings to 4.26 billion hryvnia ($532 million) as of yesterday from 11.26 billion hryvnia last January, central bank data show.
Ukraine’s IMF loan, obtained in 2010, has been frozen since last March because the government won’t approve a one-third increase in consumer energy costs, a move the Washington-based fund has demanded to trim losses at state energy company NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy.
“We can’t burden the citizens,” Yanukovych, whose ruling Party of Regions has 14 percent backing before this year’s parliamentary vote, said Feb. 16 in comments published on his website.
Instead, he wants to wipe a third off his country’s gas bill by seeking a discount on its Russian imports to $250 per 1,000 cubic meters from the $416 average price assumed in this year’s budget. The bill came to about $12 billion last year.
While the two neighbors have been negotiating for months, no agreement has been reached. Ukrainian officials say Russia wants control of the transit pipelines OAO Gazprom uses to ship gas to Europe, a similar deal to one Belarus accepted last year.
Ukraine is unwilling to sanction the sale and Prime Minister Mykola Azarov reiterated Feb. 11 that there are no plans to join a Russia-led customs union of which Belarus is also a member.
“Russia will demand a very high price in terms of sovereignty and getting control of key economic assets,” Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said Feb. 8 by phone.
Gazprom’s press service declined to comment yesterday when asked about the negotiations with Ukraine and what the company is seeking in return for potential price discounts.
Russia, which supplies Ukraine with more than 70 percent of its gas needs, agreed to cut prices in April 2010 in exchange for a 25-year extension on its lease of the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, where it has a naval base.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Ukraine Fans Default Risk in Russia Gas Bet as Vote Molds Policy
Ukraine’s efforts to seek cheaper natural gas from Russia rather than comply with the terms of a bailout have alarmed investors, propelling the former Soviet republic’s credit risk above Argentina’s for the first time in two years.
The government is shunning the International Monetary Fund as it struggles to agree on discounted fuel imports from Russia, with whom clashes halted European gas transit twice since 2006. That’s fanned concern over its ability to meet $11.9 billion in debt costs this year, with default risk rising more than any country Bloomberg tracks except Greece in the last six months.
While Ukraine faces a widening current-account gap, slowing economic growth and limited access to global capital markets, President Viktor Yanukovych has refused to raise household gas tariffs to restart a $15.6 billion IMF aid package as support for his ruling party ebbs before October elections.
“It’s a question of willingness to pay a political price,” Ronald Schneider, who helps manage about $1 billion in emerging-market debt at Raiffeisen Kapitalanlage GmbH in Vienna, said Jan. 31 by phone. “Skepticism for Ukraine will increase” without a resumption in IMF disbursements.
The cost of insuring Ukrainian state debt against non- payment for five years using credit-default swaps increased 271 basis points in the last six months to 797 on Feb. 21, according to CMA, which is owned by CME Group Inc. and compiles prices from dealers in the privately-negotiated market. That compares with 768 for Argentina, which the gauge surpassed on Jan. 13. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.
Economic growth may slow to 3.9 percent this year from about 5 percent in 2011, the government estimates, as the euro- region turmoil threatens its steel exports and cold weather curbs the grain harvest.
Pressure on the hryvnia has intensified in recent months while dwindling trust in the authorities has halted capital inflows and investment, the IMF’s Ukraine representative, Max Alier, warned former First Deputy Prime Minister Andriy Klyuev in a Jan. 31 letter, Kommersant-Ukraine reported Feb. 13.
The hryvnia declined to 8.00010 per U.S. dollar from 7.9550 in the year through Feb. 21. Ukraine’s gold and foreign-currency reserves fell $3.3 billion to $31.8 billion in 2011 as the hryvnia weakened and its current-account deficit widened to 5.5 percent of gross domestic product from 2.2 percent.
The former Soviet state’s credit-rating outlook was cut to stable from positive at Fitch Ratings in October, while Moody’s Investors Service lowered it to negative in December, citing risks to funding, liquidity and political stability. They both rate Ukraine five levels below investment grade.
The yield on the government’s Eurobond due 2016 has jumped to 8.813 percent from 6.265 percent when it was issued last June. Foreign investors have cut hryvnia-debt holdings to 4.26 billion hryvnia ($532 million) as of yesterday from 11.26 billion hryvnia in January 2011, central bank data show.
Ukraine’s IMF loan, obtained in 2010, has been frozen since last March because the government won’t approve a one-third increase in consumer energy costs, a move the Washington-based fund has demanded to trim losses at state energy company NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy.
“We can’t burden the citizens,” Yanukovych, whose ruling Party of Regions has 14 percent backing before this year’s parliamentary vote, said Feb. 16 in comments published on his website.
Instead, he wants to wipe a third off his country’s gas bill by seeking a discount on its Russian imports to $250 per 1,000 cubic meters from the $416 average price assumed in this year’s budget. The bill came to about $12 billion last year.
While the two neighbors have been negotiating for months, no agreement has been reached. Ukrainian officials say Russia wants control of the transit pipelines OAO Gazprom uses to ship gas to Europe, a similar deal to one Belarus accepted last year.
Ukraine is unwilling to sanction the sale and Prime Minister Mykola Azarov reiterated Feb. 11 that there are no plans to join a Russia-led customs union of which Belarus is also a member.
“Russia will demand a very high price in terms of sovereignty and getting control of key economic assets,” Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said Feb. 8 by phone.
Gazprom’s press service declined to comment yesterday when asked about the negotiations with Ukraine and what the company is seeking in return for potential price discounts.
Russia, which supplies Ukraine with more than 70 percent of its gas needs, agreed to cut prices in April 2010 in exchange for a 25-year extension on its lease of the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, where it has a naval base.
The two countries have fallen out over Ukrainian cheese imports, with Russia banning products from three plants on quality grounds. Russia halted Ukrainian dairy imports in 2006 after it cut gas supplies during a price dispute.
Ukraine doesn’t appear ready to make concessions, according to Alex Brideau, an analyst at Eurasia Group in Tokyo.
“At the same time, it wants a deal quickly, so as to minimize the economic damage from high prices,” he said in a Feb. 10 note. “The combination of these factors makes it probable that tension will escalate between the two sides in the coming weeks.”
With Russian gas talks dragging on and no sign of a compromise with the IMF, Ukraine has said it may seek to raise funds on international markets next month.
The government plans to borrow 12.15 billion hryvnia abroad in March, almost a third of its full-year target for foreign borrowing, the Finance Ministry said Feb. 9. It picked JP Morgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley and Russia’s VTB Capital and Troika Dialog, which is controlled by OAO Sberbank, to lead manage a potential Eurobond sale, the ministry said Feb. 3.
Whether Ukraine can successfully sell debt abroad depends on foreign-investor appetite and the government’s readiness to accept higher borrowing costs, Olena Bilan, chief economist at Dragon Capital in Kiev, wrote in a Feb. 10 note.
“Unless the Ukrainian authorities succeed in reducing fiscal and external pressures -- the main Ukrainian macro risk at the moment -- we don’t think investors will be prepared to accept a single-digit yield on new Ukrainian debt,” she said.
Ukraine will service and repay all of its debt, Halyna Pakhachuk, head of the Finance Ministry’s financial policy and government-debt management department, said Feb. 16.
The budget deficit reached 4.3 percent of GDP last year, with Naftogaz’s shortfall widening to 20.6 billion hryvnia, according to the Finance Ministry.
Ukraine’s currency may fall further without measures to bolster public finances, according to Sergei Strigo, who helps manage about $750 million as head of emerging-market debt at Amundi Group in London. Amundi cut its holdings of hryvnia- denominated bonds at the end of last year after the chances of a “substantial” devaluation in the currency in 2012 rose.
The government is shunning the International Monetary Fund as it struggles to agree on discounted fuel imports from Russia, with whom clashes halted European gas transit twice since 2006. That’s fanned concern over its ability to meet $11.9 billion in debt costs this year, with default risk rising more than any country Bloomberg tracks except Greece in the last six months.
While Ukraine faces a widening current-account gap, slowing economic growth and limited access to global capital markets, President Viktor Yanukovych has refused to raise household gas tariffs to restart a $15.6 billion IMF aid package as support for his ruling party ebbs before October elections.
“It’s a question of willingness to pay a political price,” Ronald Schneider, who helps manage about $1 billion in emerging-market debt at Raiffeisen Kapitalanlage GmbH in Vienna, said Jan. 31 by phone. “Skepticism for Ukraine will increase” without a resumption in IMF disbursements.
The cost of insuring Ukrainian state debt against non- payment for five years using credit-default swaps increased 271 basis points in the last six months to 797 on Feb. 21, according to CMA, which is owned by CME Group Inc. and compiles prices from dealers in the privately-negotiated market. That compares with 768 for Argentina, which the gauge surpassed on Jan. 13. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.
Economic growth may slow to 3.9 percent this year from about 5 percent in 2011, the government estimates, as the euro- region turmoil threatens its steel exports and cold weather curbs the grain harvest.
Pressure on the hryvnia has intensified in recent months while dwindling trust in the authorities has halted capital inflows and investment, the IMF’s Ukraine representative, Max Alier, warned former First Deputy Prime Minister Andriy Klyuev in a Jan. 31 letter, Kommersant-Ukraine reported Feb. 13.
The hryvnia declined to 8.00010 per U.S. dollar from 7.9550 in the year through Feb. 21. Ukraine’s gold and foreign-currency reserves fell $3.3 billion to $31.8 billion in 2011 as the hryvnia weakened and its current-account deficit widened to 5.5 percent of gross domestic product from 2.2 percent.
The former Soviet state’s credit-rating outlook was cut to stable from positive at Fitch Ratings in October, while Moody’s Investors Service lowered it to negative in December, citing risks to funding, liquidity and political stability. They both rate Ukraine five levels below investment grade.
The yield on the government’s Eurobond due 2016 has jumped to 8.813 percent from 6.265 percent when it was issued last June. Foreign investors have cut hryvnia-debt holdings to 4.26 billion hryvnia ($532 million) as of yesterday from 11.26 billion hryvnia in January 2011, central bank data show.
Ukraine’s IMF loan, obtained in 2010, has been frozen since last March because the government won’t approve a one-third increase in consumer energy costs, a move the Washington-based fund has demanded to trim losses at state energy company NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy.
“We can’t burden the citizens,” Yanukovych, whose ruling Party of Regions has 14 percent backing before this year’s parliamentary vote, said Feb. 16 in comments published on his website.
Instead, he wants to wipe a third off his country’s gas bill by seeking a discount on its Russian imports to $250 per 1,000 cubic meters from the $416 average price assumed in this year’s budget. The bill came to about $12 billion last year.
While the two neighbors have been negotiating for months, no agreement has been reached. Ukrainian officials say Russia wants control of the transit pipelines OAO Gazprom uses to ship gas to Europe, a similar deal to one Belarus accepted last year.
Ukraine is unwilling to sanction the sale and Prime Minister Mykola Azarov reiterated Feb. 11 that there are no plans to join a Russia-led customs union of which Belarus is also a member.
“Russia will demand a very high price in terms of sovereignty and getting control of key economic assets,” Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said Feb. 8 by phone.
Gazprom’s press service declined to comment yesterday when asked about the negotiations with Ukraine and what the company is seeking in return for potential price discounts.
Russia, which supplies Ukraine with more than 70 percent of its gas needs, agreed to cut prices in April 2010 in exchange for a 25-year extension on its lease of the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, where it has a naval base.
The two countries have fallen out over Ukrainian cheese imports, with Russia banning products from three plants on quality grounds. Russia halted Ukrainian dairy imports in 2006 after it cut gas supplies during a price dispute.
Ukraine doesn’t appear ready to make concessions, according to Alex Brideau, an analyst at Eurasia Group in Tokyo.
“At the same time, it wants a deal quickly, so as to minimize the economic damage from high prices,” he said in a Feb. 10 note. “The combination of these factors makes it probable that tension will escalate between the two sides in the coming weeks.”
With Russian gas talks dragging on and no sign of a compromise with the IMF, Ukraine has said it may seek to raise funds on international markets next month.
The government plans to borrow 12.15 billion hryvnia abroad in March, almost a third of its full-year target for foreign borrowing, the Finance Ministry said Feb. 9. It picked JP Morgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley and Russia’s VTB Capital and Troika Dialog, which is controlled by OAO Sberbank, to lead manage a potential Eurobond sale, the ministry said Feb. 3.
Whether Ukraine can successfully sell debt abroad depends on foreign-investor appetite and the government’s readiness to accept higher borrowing costs, Olena Bilan, chief economist at Dragon Capital in Kiev, wrote in a Feb. 10 note.
“Unless the Ukrainian authorities succeed in reducing fiscal and external pressures -- the main Ukrainian macro risk at the moment -- we don’t think investors will be prepared to accept a single-digit yield on new Ukrainian debt,” she said.
Ukraine will service and repay all of its debt, Halyna Pakhachuk, head of the Finance Ministry’s financial policy and government-debt management department, said Feb. 16.
The budget deficit reached 4.3 percent of GDP last year, with Naftogaz’s shortfall widening to 20.6 billion hryvnia, according to the Finance Ministry.
Ukraine’s currency may fall further without measures to bolster public finances, according to Sergei Strigo, who helps manage about $750 million as head of emerging-market debt at Amundi Group in London. Amundi cut its holdings of hryvnia- denominated bonds at the end of last year after the chances of a “substantial” devaluation in the currency in 2012 rose.
Monday, February 20, 2012
U.S. manufacturing sees shortage of skilled factory workers
This stretch of the Rust Belt might seem like an easy place to find factory workers.
Unemployment hovers above 9 percent. Foreign competition has thrown many out of work. It is a platitude that this industrial hub, like the country itself, needs more manufacturing work.
But as the 2012 presidential candidates roam the state offering ways to “bring the jobs back,” many manufacturers say that, in fact, the jobs are already here.
What’s missing are the skilled workers needed to fill them.
A metal-parts factory here has been searching since the fall for a machinist, an assembly team leader and a die-setter. Another plant is offering referral bonuses for a welder. And a company that makes molds for automakers has been trying for seven months to fill four spots on the second shift.
“Our guys have been working 60 to 70 hours a week, and they’re dead. They’re gone,” said Corey Carolla, vice president of operations at Mach Mold, a 40-man shop in Benton Harbor, Mich. “We need more people. The trouble is finding them.”
Through a combination of overseas competition and productivity gains, the United States has lost nearly 4 million manufacturing jobs in the past 10 years. But many manufacturers say the losses have not yielded a surplus of skilled factory workers.
Instead, as automation has transformed factories and altered the skills needed to operate and maintain factory equipment, the laid-off workers, who may be familiar with the old-fashioned presses and lathes, are often unqualified to run the new.
Compounding the problem is a demographic wave. At some factories, much of the workforce consists of baby boomers who are nearing retirement. Many of the younger workers who might have taken their place have avoided the manufacturing sector because of the volatility and stigma of factory work, as well as perceptions that U.S. manufacturing is a “dying industry.”
“Politicians make it sound like there’s a line out front of workers with a big sign saying ‘No more jobs,’” said Matt Tyler, chief executive of a precision metal company in New Troy, Mich. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”
The shortage of skilled workers was noted before the recession, but the phenomenon has become more acute with the recent recovery.
Just this week, Tyler said, when a fracking company asked him to make pieces for pipes, his chief worry was whether he could find six new operators to do the work.
“This was never a problem I thought we’d be having,” he said.
The frustrations are shared across the country.
A recent report by Deloitte for the Manufacturing Institute, based on a survey of manufacturers, found that as many as 600,000 jobs are going unfilled. By comparison, the unemployed in the United States number 12.8 million, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“High unemployment is not making it easier to fill positions, particularly in the areas of skilled production and production support,” the Deloitte report found.
Similarly, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that although fewer machinists would be employed in the future, job opportunities “should continue to be good” because many young people with the right aptitudes were preferring other fields.
Unemployment hovers above 9 percent. Foreign competition has thrown many out of work. It is a platitude that this industrial hub, like the country itself, needs more manufacturing work.
But as the 2012 presidential candidates roam the state offering ways to “bring the jobs back,” many manufacturers say that, in fact, the jobs are already here.
What’s missing are the skilled workers needed to fill them.
A metal-parts factory here has been searching since the fall for a machinist, an assembly team leader and a die-setter. Another plant is offering referral bonuses for a welder. And a company that makes molds for automakers has been trying for seven months to fill four spots on the second shift.
“Our guys have been working 60 to 70 hours a week, and they’re dead. They’re gone,” said Corey Carolla, vice president of operations at Mach Mold, a 40-man shop in Benton Harbor, Mich. “We need more people. The trouble is finding them.”
Through a combination of overseas competition and productivity gains, the United States has lost nearly 4 million manufacturing jobs in the past 10 years. But many manufacturers say the losses have not yielded a surplus of skilled factory workers.
Instead, as automation has transformed factories and altered the skills needed to operate and maintain factory equipment, the laid-off workers, who may be familiar with the old-fashioned presses and lathes, are often unqualified to run the new.
Compounding the problem is a demographic wave. At some factories, much of the workforce consists of baby boomers who are nearing retirement. Many of the younger workers who might have taken their place have avoided the manufacturing sector because of the volatility and stigma of factory work, as well as perceptions that U.S. manufacturing is a “dying industry.”
“Politicians make it sound like there’s a line out front of workers with a big sign saying ‘No more jobs,’” said Matt Tyler, chief executive of a precision metal company in New Troy, Mich. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”
The shortage of skilled workers was noted before the recession, but the phenomenon has become more acute with the recent recovery.
Just this week, Tyler said, when a fracking company asked him to make pieces for pipes, his chief worry was whether he could find six new operators to do the work.
“This was never a problem I thought we’d be having,” he said.
The frustrations are shared across the country.
A recent report by Deloitte for the Manufacturing Institute, based on a survey of manufacturers, found that as many as 600,000 jobs are going unfilled. By comparison, the unemployed in the United States number 12.8 million, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“High unemployment is not making it easier to fill positions, particularly in the areas of skilled production and production support,” the Deloitte report found.
Similarly, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that although fewer machinists would be employed in the future, job opportunities “should continue to be good” because many young people with the right aptitudes were preferring other fields.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Does Linus Omark fit into the Edmonton Oilers future plans?
Ever since he made his debut with the Edmonton Oilers, Linus Omark has held a soft spot in the hearts of many Oiler fans. The diminutive winger has a very special skill set and is arguably the most talented of all the youngsters currently in the Oilers stable. Having just recently turned twenty-five years old, Omark is older then the core group but still fits the mold of what has now become the prototype for Edmonton Oiler forwards.
With the additions of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Ryan Smyth being brought into the mix this season, Linus did not get much of shot to prove his worth and has seemed to become nothing more than an after thought for the organization. Considering they sent him down to the minors after only five games, tells me the plan was never for him to be part of the equation this season.
Shortly after being demoted to Oklahoma City, Omark broke his ankle and remained out of the Barons lineup until February 9th. Since returning from injury, he has played four games and has managed to score three times while collecting five points. He is starting to find his groove after missing nearly three months and with the NHL Trade Deadline just around the corner, the talented Swede will surely find himself back in Edmonton. While the kid has warts to his game, he should be nowhere near the AHL and should be learning from his mistakes at the NHL level. Having said that, if Omark receives the call back up to Edmonton and proves his worth over the final twenty or so games, would he have a legitimate shot at earning a regular spot in 2012-2013?
At this stage of the game, it is pretty clear that if Linus were to make this club, it will have to be as a top six forward. Some had thought, myself included, that he could possibly fit as a third line guy who specialized on the power play but with this clubs lack of size upfront, they can not afford the luxury of having a player that size in their bottom six.
If we take a look into the Oilers crystal ball, we can safely assume Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle and Nugent-Hopkins all are locks for top six roles. If Edmonton decides to move Ales Hemsky at the deadline and re-sign Sam Gagner, that would leave two spots open in the top six. One would have to think, that one of those spots will be given to Magnus Paajarvi. The twenty year old would be headed into his third full season and it would seem logical for him to get a full time shot at top line minutes. That brings it down to one vacant spot and the chances of this team not adding a veteran forward to play on the top two lines is basically zero.
Clearly, the situation doesn't look good for Omark but if he were to show that he could be a difference maker on a nightly basis, he would force management to reconsider. If Linus is that good, perhaps they seriously look at moving Gagner + to try and acquire that first pairing defenceman they so desperately need. Not exactly a likely scenario but one that would have to be considered, if it were to present itself.
No matter how you look at it, it appears very unlikely that Linus Omark will be a member of the Edmonton Oilers organization come the start of next season. If the club believes they have better options upfront then the gifted winger, then by all means, ship him out and let the kid try luck elsewhere. The issue I have, is they may very well move him to another team before ever giving him a legitmate opportunity to show what he could do with other highly skilled forwards...and it might be a decision that comes back to haunt them.
With the additions of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Ryan Smyth being brought into the mix this season, Linus did not get much of shot to prove his worth and has seemed to become nothing more than an after thought for the organization. Considering they sent him down to the minors after only five games, tells me the plan was never for him to be part of the equation this season.
Shortly after being demoted to Oklahoma City, Omark broke his ankle and remained out of the Barons lineup until February 9th. Since returning from injury, he has played four games and has managed to score three times while collecting five points. He is starting to find his groove after missing nearly three months and with the NHL Trade Deadline just around the corner, the talented Swede will surely find himself back in Edmonton. While the kid has warts to his game, he should be nowhere near the AHL and should be learning from his mistakes at the NHL level. Having said that, if Omark receives the call back up to Edmonton and proves his worth over the final twenty or so games, would he have a legitimate shot at earning a regular spot in 2012-2013?
At this stage of the game, it is pretty clear that if Linus were to make this club, it will have to be as a top six forward. Some had thought, myself included, that he could possibly fit as a third line guy who specialized on the power play but with this clubs lack of size upfront, they can not afford the luxury of having a player that size in their bottom six.
If we take a look into the Oilers crystal ball, we can safely assume Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle and Nugent-Hopkins all are locks for top six roles. If Edmonton decides to move Ales Hemsky at the deadline and re-sign Sam Gagner, that would leave two spots open in the top six. One would have to think, that one of those spots will be given to Magnus Paajarvi. The twenty year old would be headed into his third full season and it would seem logical for him to get a full time shot at top line minutes. That brings it down to one vacant spot and the chances of this team not adding a veteran forward to play on the top two lines is basically zero.
Clearly, the situation doesn't look good for Omark but if he were to show that he could be a difference maker on a nightly basis, he would force management to reconsider. If Linus is that good, perhaps they seriously look at moving Gagner + to try and acquire that first pairing defenceman they so desperately need. Not exactly a likely scenario but one that would have to be considered, if it were to present itself.
No matter how you look at it, it appears very unlikely that Linus Omark will be a member of the Edmonton Oilers organization come the start of next season. If the club believes they have better options upfront then the gifted winger, then by all means, ship him out and let the kid try luck elsewhere. The issue I have, is they may very well move him to another team before ever giving him a legitmate opportunity to show what he could do with other highly skilled forwards...and it might be a decision that comes back to haunt them.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Cheryl pours heart into the art of chocolate
ANYONE who has seen the film Chocolat will remember the mouth-watering scenes of bowls full of molten milk, dark and white chocolate being prepared in the quaint Chocolaterie.
Ever since watching leading lady Vianne Rocher, played by French actress Juliette Binoche, whip up trays full of delicious-looking, sumptuous snacks, I have wanted to try my hand at making some chocolate treats of my own.
So it was lucky for me that local chocolatier Cheryl Brighty, whose first chocolate shop opened in Newmarket’s Sun Lane on Saturday, invited me to spend a few hours learning the fine art of chocolate making.
I arrive in the kitchen of Cheryl’s Granby Street home, the headquarters of Artistry in Cocoa, where she makes everything from truffles and chocolate bars to chocolate cakes and hot chocolate.
After pausing to enjoy the incredible aroma coming from a mini-vat of melted chocolate in one corner of the kitchen, I stepped into my chocolatier’s attire of a chef’s shirt, and rather fetching hair net, to start making a set of 24 Amaretto truffles.
These truffles are one of the last batches to be made from Cheryl’s home, now that the Artistry in Cocoa shop is up and running.
The business began about seven years ago, originally known as Amy’s Truffles, as a way to raise extra cash to send Cheryl’s daughter, Amy, on a trip to Peru.
As the trip approached, Cheryl’s regular customers began to worry they wouldn’t be able to buy any more of her chocolates, so she carried on and re-launched as Artistry in Cocoa.
Cheryl tells me we are going to temper the chocolate the “old-fashioned way”, with the same technique used by Vianne in Chocolat, known as tabliering.
Tabliering comes from the French word for table and involves gently cooling down melted chocolate on a heat-absorbing surface, usually a marble slab, by moving it around using a palette knife, the point being to get the chocolate to the correct temperature.
After an expert demonstration from Cheryl, it’s my turn. Suited and booted, and armed with a bowlful of melted chocolate from the mini-vat, I begin tempering the chocolate. I pour some on to a work surface and begin to move it around to thicken it up. Cheryl, who spent many years working as a science teacher in schools in Newmarket, is perfectly suited to understand the science behind preparing chocolate.
She tells me: “As you move the chocolate around, the cocoa butter in the chocolate will crystallise, which is what makes the chocolate set and the idea is it’s warm enough to melt out all the crystals that we don’t want and leave the ones we do.”
Moving the chocolate around is easy enough, but it gets a bit trickier when I have to use the palette knife to move the thickened chocolate back into a mixing bowl, ready to pour into a mould, although Cheryl tells me I don’t need to worry about splashing chocolate all over the place, as it can be scraped off the surface and used again.
I warm the plastic mould using a heat gun so the chocolate doesn’t set too quickly to be able to move around to fill the entire mould.
Speed is the key as I pour the liquid chocolate, making sure it moves in all directions to fill each shape. I scrape off the excess chocolate and tap the mould against the work surface, to make sure no air bubbles remain in the chocolate.
Then, I leave the mould upside down on a baking tray, to allow air to get to the chocolate as it sets.
Next, I fill an icing bag with a chocolate and Amaretto mixture that Cheryl whipped up earlier and pipe it on top of the chocolate layer in the mould, being careful to get just the right amount. Another layer of chocolate is poured over the Amaretto mixture to complete the truffles and I leave them to set.
A few minutes later, I feel a sense of triumph when I tap the mould against the work surface and out pop some not quite perfect, but pretty good, Amaretto truffles. Before my chocolate creations are wrapped up with a red ribbon for me to take away with me, I’m allowed a cheeky taste of the sweet chocolates with a kick of Amaretto.
Ever since watching leading lady Vianne Rocher, played by French actress Juliette Binoche, whip up trays full of delicious-looking, sumptuous snacks, I have wanted to try my hand at making some chocolate treats of my own.
So it was lucky for me that local chocolatier Cheryl Brighty, whose first chocolate shop opened in Newmarket’s Sun Lane on Saturday, invited me to spend a few hours learning the fine art of chocolate making.
I arrive in the kitchen of Cheryl’s Granby Street home, the headquarters of Artistry in Cocoa, where she makes everything from truffles and chocolate bars to chocolate cakes and hot chocolate.
After pausing to enjoy the incredible aroma coming from a mini-vat of melted chocolate in one corner of the kitchen, I stepped into my chocolatier’s attire of a chef’s shirt, and rather fetching hair net, to start making a set of 24 Amaretto truffles.
These truffles are one of the last batches to be made from Cheryl’s home, now that the Artistry in Cocoa shop is up and running.
The business began about seven years ago, originally known as Amy’s Truffles, as a way to raise extra cash to send Cheryl’s daughter, Amy, on a trip to Peru.
As the trip approached, Cheryl’s regular customers began to worry they wouldn’t be able to buy any more of her chocolates, so she carried on and re-launched as Artistry in Cocoa.
Cheryl tells me we are going to temper the chocolate the “old-fashioned way”, with the same technique used by Vianne in Chocolat, known as tabliering.
Tabliering comes from the French word for table and involves gently cooling down melted chocolate on a heat-absorbing surface, usually a marble slab, by moving it around using a palette knife, the point being to get the chocolate to the correct temperature.
After an expert demonstration from Cheryl, it’s my turn. Suited and booted, and armed with a bowlful of melted chocolate from the mini-vat, I begin tempering the chocolate. I pour some on to a work surface and begin to move it around to thicken it up. Cheryl, who spent many years working as a science teacher in schools in Newmarket, is perfectly suited to understand the science behind preparing chocolate.
She tells me: “As you move the chocolate around, the cocoa butter in the chocolate will crystallise, which is what makes the chocolate set and the idea is it’s warm enough to melt out all the crystals that we don’t want and leave the ones we do.”
Moving the chocolate around is easy enough, but it gets a bit trickier when I have to use the palette knife to move the thickened chocolate back into a mixing bowl, ready to pour into a mould, although Cheryl tells me I don’t need to worry about splashing chocolate all over the place, as it can be scraped off the surface and used again.
I warm the plastic mould using a heat gun so the chocolate doesn’t set too quickly to be able to move around to fill the entire mould.
Speed is the key as I pour the liquid chocolate, making sure it moves in all directions to fill each shape. I scrape off the excess chocolate and tap the mould against the work surface, to make sure no air bubbles remain in the chocolate.
Then, I leave the mould upside down on a baking tray, to allow air to get to the chocolate as it sets.
Next, I fill an icing bag with a chocolate and Amaretto mixture that Cheryl whipped up earlier and pipe it on top of the chocolate layer in the mould, being careful to get just the right amount. Another layer of chocolate is poured over the Amaretto mixture to complete the truffles and I leave them to set.
A few minutes later, I feel a sense of triumph when I tap the mould against the work surface and out pop some not quite perfect, but pretty good, Amaretto truffles. Before my chocolate creations are wrapped up with a red ribbon for me to take away with me, I’m allowed a cheeky taste of the sweet chocolates with a kick of Amaretto.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Six Characters in Search of an Author
"Pirandellian" isn't officially an adjective to describe a strange blending of fact and fiction, but good drama students should get the reference if they've ever studied Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello's massively influential 1920s drama Six Characters in Search of an Author.
And if any of those drama students failed to grasp exactly what Pirandello's suspenseful and disturbing play meant on the page, then they (and any other open-minded theatergoer) should rush to see The Hypocrites' wonderful new world-premiere adaptation by Steve Moulds.
Six Characters… is famous as a mind-bending play within a play to challenge an audience's perception of what is real and re-enacted and how dreamed-up characters can become frighteningly real and achieve a sense of immortality. What's wonderful with Mould's adaptation is how he brings it so cleverly up to date and customizes his script to fit the demands and character of The Hypocrites as a scrappy and critically-admired Chicago theater troupe.
Set amid leftover elements from The Hypocrites' acclaimed revival of The Pirates of Penzance, Six Characters… ostensibly begins as a "put-in rehearsal" demonstration to show invited supporters (you, the audience) how the company goes about its artistic business. Actors like John Taflan and Laura McKenzie are late or not fully memorized, while the authority of replacement director Brennan Buhl and his stage manager Ryan Walter frequently get tested.
Into this disorganized demonstration arrive six ghostly characters from a blended family (Ted Evans, Stevi Baston, Michael Molito, Samantha Gleisten, Ada Grey and Larry Garner) with some demanding help from an author to dramatize their conflicting stories of woe. Once you get past their lengthy exposition, the six bickering and unsettlingly quiet family members offer riveting accounts of what brought so much shame and ruin to their unhappy family.
Hypocrites artistic director Halena Kays handles the comic and dramatic shifts in tone marvelously in an environmental staging cleverly designed by Lizzie Bracken around the remnants of Tom Burch's zany Pirates of Penzance set of partial wooden piers, round picnic tables and a plastic swimming pool.
Adding immeasurably to the creepiness of the piece is Maggie Fullilove-Nugent's initially harsh and then ghostly lighting design mixed with Kevin O'Donnell's sound design that turns up the tension. Costumer Alison Heryer also has fun with the hip young actors before going nearly black and white for the distressed family.
With Mould's Six Characters…, The Hypocrites has once again taken a theater classic and reinterpreted it to make it dramatically fresh and insightfully new. Six Characters… will make you laugh up-front, but later haunt you into thinking about the thin barriers of facts and re-created fiction.
And if any of those drama students failed to grasp exactly what Pirandello's suspenseful and disturbing play meant on the page, then they (and any other open-minded theatergoer) should rush to see The Hypocrites' wonderful new world-premiere adaptation by Steve Moulds.
Six Characters… is famous as a mind-bending play within a play to challenge an audience's perception of what is real and re-enacted and how dreamed-up characters can become frighteningly real and achieve a sense of immortality. What's wonderful with Mould's adaptation is how he brings it so cleverly up to date and customizes his script to fit the demands and character of The Hypocrites as a scrappy and critically-admired Chicago theater troupe.
Set amid leftover elements from The Hypocrites' acclaimed revival of The Pirates of Penzance, Six Characters… ostensibly begins as a "put-in rehearsal" demonstration to show invited supporters (you, the audience) how the company goes about its artistic business. Actors like John Taflan and Laura McKenzie are late or not fully memorized, while the authority of replacement director Brennan Buhl and his stage manager Ryan Walter frequently get tested.
Into this disorganized demonstration arrive six ghostly characters from a blended family (Ted Evans, Stevi Baston, Michael Molito, Samantha Gleisten, Ada Grey and Larry Garner) with some demanding help from an author to dramatize their conflicting stories of woe. Once you get past their lengthy exposition, the six bickering and unsettlingly quiet family members offer riveting accounts of what brought so much shame and ruin to their unhappy family.
Hypocrites artistic director Halena Kays handles the comic and dramatic shifts in tone marvelously in an environmental staging cleverly designed by Lizzie Bracken around the remnants of Tom Burch's zany Pirates of Penzance set of partial wooden piers, round picnic tables and a plastic swimming pool.
Adding immeasurably to the creepiness of the piece is Maggie Fullilove-Nugent's initially harsh and then ghostly lighting design mixed with Kevin O'Donnell's sound design that turns up the tension. Costumer Alison Heryer also has fun with the hip young actors before going nearly black and white for the distressed family.
With Mould's Six Characters…, The Hypocrites has once again taken a theater classic and reinterpreted it to make it dramatically fresh and insightfully new. Six Characters… will make you laugh up-front, but later haunt you into thinking about the thin barriers of facts and re-created fiction.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Paper alloy could replace plastic in laptops, gadgets
Ever since Greenpeace started releasing its Greener Electronics Guide, a number of high profile manufacturers have removed many of the harmful chemicals from their products. But one material that’s tough to replace is plastic. It’s cheap, very hard-wearing, and easily molded into complex shapes. The problem is, it isn’t very environmentally-friendly as it doesn’t degrade very quickly.
A solution is on the horizon, however, and you may be surprised to find a replacement has been found for plastic made of paper. That’s right, in the future the laptop you buy may not be encased in plastic (or metal). Instead, it will use an environmentally friendly paper alloy.
The new material is actually called Paper PP Alloy. It is made using a combination of recycled paper and polypropylene–a thermoplastic that is widely recycled while remaining hard-wearing. Because it uses only materials that can be easily recycled it is a desirable replacement for plastic. The Paper PP Alloy can also easily be molded, even using injection molding, meaning if you can form a shape in plastic you can probably do the same with paper alloy.
The alloy has been developed by PEGA, who say that even the manufacturing process is similar to that used for plastic. All we need now is for tech manufacturers to jump on board and start using Paper PP Alloy in their products. And it doesn’t just have to be laptops. Think of anything that needs a casing, or ships with plastic parts, and paper alloy forms an alternative.
If a well-known manufacturer does embrace paper alloy, they will certainly benefit from the eco-value it offers in terms of marketing. Who knows, maybe a future iPad will ship with a paper alloy back.
A solution is on the horizon, however, and you may be surprised to find a replacement has been found for plastic made of paper. That’s right, in the future the laptop you buy may not be encased in plastic (or metal). Instead, it will use an environmentally friendly paper alloy.
The new material is actually called Paper PP Alloy. It is made using a combination of recycled paper and polypropylene–a thermoplastic that is widely recycled while remaining hard-wearing. Because it uses only materials that can be easily recycled it is a desirable replacement for plastic. The Paper PP Alloy can also easily be molded, even using injection molding, meaning if you can form a shape in plastic you can probably do the same with paper alloy.
The alloy has been developed by PEGA, who say that even the manufacturing process is similar to that used for plastic. All we need now is for tech manufacturers to jump on board and start using Paper PP Alloy in their products. And it doesn’t just have to be laptops. Think of anything that needs a casing, or ships with plastic parts, and paper alloy forms an alternative.
If a well-known manufacturer does embrace paper alloy, they will certainly benefit from the eco-value it offers in terms of marketing. Who knows, maybe a future iPad will ship with a paper alloy back.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Fans weigh-in on Diablo 3 difficulty
It looks like the eagerly anticipated Diablo 3 will not be a diluted version of the last one and more apparent to the settings found in the first game which is a welcome sign for some gamers. This news comes as a video of the difficulty shows the developers saying that you definitely will die playing this version, in fact they promise.
As the upcoming fantasy horror-themed action RPG is getting plenty of attention from websites and gamers alike, AusGamers writes about the competitive challenge involved in Diablo 3 and that the video talks about the higher difficulty which means more participants will have to play together to get a result. Comments have suggested that the beta version may have a decent difficulty scope but the leveling up and new skills are nothing to get excited about. Questions have been asked about whether the difficulty will adapt to those who are not dying or if it is just set as standard.
In the video they promise us that it will kick our ass in anything above normal mode and in Nightmare, Hell and Inferno mode it starts getting so hectic that you will need your gems and enchants to boost up your defense so just rushing in will get you killed. On Gaming Blend we are asked to hold on while they let us in on a story that is involved in the new Diablo title as apparently there was not much of that going on in the previous encounters.
The basic principal of clicking and looting is still there but Blizzard has made the story side one of their concerns in this game and starting in New Tristram there is a new town built from the ruined village of the first Diablo. In the beta helping the guards see off the zombies and communicating with the villagers starts the game off quite well and the characters seem to be doing more than in the previous titles.
There is more emphasis on finding your companions as opposed to just hiring them and when rescuing a certain character you will find yourself on a mission to assist their needs as well as your own, as a form of give and take. Tooling a companion up to partner you on an adventure allows a bit of interaction and a bond, there is also an opportunity to take a rest from the adventure and read into the characters history for an ideal way to get a more in-depth impression of the game. Overall, the story-driven experience was welcomed even though endless search for loot will always be a main objective and the good thing is that the story aspect compromises none of the action involved.
Some gamers feel that the previous games did have viable stories if you took the time to read them instead of skipping them, which is probably what the author was implying. To get your own impression on what the developers are saying take a look at the video below. Let us know what you think of the difficulty in Diablo 3?
As the upcoming fantasy horror-themed action RPG is getting plenty of attention from websites and gamers alike, AusGamers writes about the competitive challenge involved in Diablo 3 and that the video talks about the higher difficulty which means more participants will have to play together to get a result. Comments have suggested that the beta version may have a decent difficulty scope but the leveling up and new skills are nothing to get excited about. Questions have been asked about whether the difficulty will adapt to those who are not dying or if it is just set as standard.
In the video they promise us that it will kick our ass in anything above normal mode and in Nightmare, Hell and Inferno mode it starts getting so hectic that you will need your gems and enchants to boost up your defense so just rushing in will get you killed. On Gaming Blend we are asked to hold on while they let us in on a story that is involved in the new Diablo title as apparently there was not much of that going on in the previous encounters.
The basic principal of clicking and looting is still there but Blizzard has made the story side one of their concerns in this game and starting in New Tristram there is a new town built from the ruined village of the first Diablo. In the beta helping the guards see off the zombies and communicating with the villagers starts the game off quite well and the characters seem to be doing more than in the previous titles.
There is more emphasis on finding your companions as opposed to just hiring them and when rescuing a certain character you will find yourself on a mission to assist their needs as well as your own, as a form of give and take. Tooling a companion up to partner you on an adventure allows a bit of interaction and a bond, there is also an opportunity to take a rest from the adventure and read into the characters history for an ideal way to get a more in-depth impression of the game. Overall, the story-driven experience was welcomed even though endless search for loot will always be a main objective and the good thing is that the story aspect compromises none of the action involved.
Some gamers feel that the previous games did have viable stories if you took the time to read them instead of skipping them, which is probably what the author was implying. To get your own impression on what the developers are saying take a look at the video below. Let us know what you think of the difficulty in Diablo 3?
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Inanities capture culture
As I look back on my more than six decades on this planet, I often wonder what happened to us, those with whom I have traveled through this specific time and unique space? I remember the 1960s and ’70s; there was turmoil and conflict, yet many were politically active, environmentally aware and pushing for positive change. Much was accomplished. Civil rights and environmental issues were addressed, and new laws emerged, making our nation better, healthier and more fair.
Overnight, it seemed, political and commercial interests co-opted and captured this freshly created common culture, the music changed and other less benign forces merged with and came to dominate the message and messenger. Whether it was from exposure to the beguiling light of one too many disco balls or the “greed is good” message from the Reagan era, society’s direction and mood was distinctly altered.
In 1977, I went shopping for a new vehicle. At the time, with the country’s focus on energy conservation, the diesel Volkswagen Rabbit, with its 50 miles per gallon, was much sought after. Determined to get one for myself, I ventured out to the local VW dealer, only to find that because of demand none were available. Not many years later the nation’s citizenry, after being bombarded with the message to consume and recreate, were tooling around in behemoth SUVs and clambering for ever expanding McMansions.
What happened to the emerging awareness that actions have consequences? For a short time, there was a glow, an underlying perception that with forthright long-range planning and cooperative action, it was possible to pass on to future generations a healthy, livable world. There was hope and expectation in the prospect of a sustainable relationship with the earth, all other life and its processes. Where did this feeling, this hopefulness go?
Now, with inane chants of “drill baby drill” echoing in our national consciousness, we are beginning to hear other voices. A strong undercurrent of unease is awakening those who are tired of being used, ignored and lied to. Look around, what we see is not pretty. To protect corporate interests and provide more profit to those already awash in material wealth, workers are locked out, the environment is compromised and unjust wars are waged in our name.
Will we continue to sleepwalk through life remaining unaware that the dream we have been sold is unraveling? The future holds the prospect of major societal change with the direction of change not clear. We, the human beings of this planet, will decide one way or another. With our collective future at risk, it makes you wonder what our legacy will be and what our children’s grandchildren will think of us.
Overnight, it seemed, political and commercial interests co-opted and captured this freshly created common culture, the music changed and other less benign forces merged with and came to dominate the message and messenger. Whether it was from exposure to the beguiling light of one too many disco balls or the “greed is good” message from the Reagan era, society’s direction and mood was distinctly altered.
In 1977, I went shopping for a new vehicle. At the time, with the country’s focus on energy conservation, the diesel Volkswagen Rabbit, with its 50 miles per gallon, was much sought after. Determined to get one for myself, I ventured out to the local VW dealer, only to find that because of demand none were available. Not many years later the nation’s citizenry, after being bombarded with the message to consume and recreate, were tooling around in behemoth SUVs and clambering for ever expanding McMansions.
What happened to the emerging awareness that actions have consequences? For a short time, there was a glow, an underlying perception that with forthright long-range planning and cooperative action, it was possible to pass on to future generations a healthy, livable world. There was hope and expectation in the prospect of a sustainable relationship with the earth, all other life and its processes. Where did this feeling, this hopefulness go?
Now, with inane chants of “drill baby drill” echoing in our national consciousness, we are beginning to hear other voices. A strong undercurrent of unease is awakening those who are tired of being used, ignored and lied to. Look around, what we see is not pretty. To protect corporate interests and provide more profit to those already awash in material wealth, workers are locked out, the environment is compromised and unjust wars are waged in our name.
Will we continue to sleepwalk through life remaining unaware that the dream we have been sold is unraveling? The future holds the prospect of major societal change with the direction of change not clear. We, the human beings of this planet, will decide one way or another. With our collective future at risk, it makes you wonder what our legacy will be and what our children’s grandchildren will think of us.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Tackle mildew once and for all
Mildew is a type of mould - a funguslike organism that thrives in moisture-rich environments and can grow on any damp, flat surface: ceilings, tile grout, window sills, walls and even floors.
The black mildew that is commonly found in bathrooms is usually stachybotrys chartarum. In large quantities it can cause health problems in both animals and people.
Not only does mildew look unsightly, it also produces a musty odour and, in unaired environments, can spread alarmingly quickly. Spores move through the air and can settle and grow on any surface that is damp enough.
Mildew grows quickly in warm, poorly aired rooms such as bathrooms and cellars, and it's a common problem in new builds because of moisture in the building materials.
The most important thing to do is to reduce the moisture in the room. Mildew can't survive in a dry environment. There are many ways to do this.
It's often not practical to air a bathroom after every use, particularly if you are dashing off to work and need to leave your home secure with windows shut. But whenever you can, leave a window open immediately after a shower or bath for at least half an hour to let excess moisture evaporate and to air out the room.
If you live in one of the many homes in the UAE that doesn't have windows in the bathroom, make sure to turn your bathroom extractor fan on whenever possible. Check that your fan is working efficiently. If your fan is old or if the room is damp even with the fan on, it might be time to consider a newer, more powerful model.
If your home is a new build, be aware that a cheap and ineffective fan might have been installed, so shop around and consider upgrading to a pricier and more powerful one.
Avoid having very hot steamy showers or baths that can produce excess condensation, and try to shower quickly.
After a shower, allow the shower curtain to air by pulling it fully across the bath - and always dry towels or laundry thoroughly straight after use in a tumble drier or outside if possible.
Keep air conditioning on cooler settings. Cool air contains less moisture than warm air does, so turn your air conditioning down a notch.
Consider getting a dehumidifier to remove excess moisture from the air. Ensure it is safe to use in damp environments such as bathrooms and consult a professional electrician beforehand.
If space or budget is limited, stock up on small moisture-absorbing sachets such as Lakeland's Hanging Moisture Absorbers (Dh70). For a cheaper alternative, fill a jar with bicarbonate of soda crystals and put it on a shelf out of sight to absorb moisture in the air. Keep an eye on it and refill it regularly.
Never use electric fans in a bathroom or wet room, but in other rooms, electric fans can help to tackle the problem by circulating the air.
The black mildew that is commonly found in bathrooms is usually stachybotrys chartarum. In large quantities it can cause health problems in both animals and people.
Not only does mildew look unsightly, it also produces a musty odour and, in unaired environments, can spread alarmingly quickly. Spores move through the air and can settle and grow on any surface that is damp enough.
Mildew grows quickly in warm, poorly aired rooms such as bathrooms and cellars, and it's a common problem in new builds because of moisture in the building materials.
The most important thing to do is to reduce the moisture in the room. Mildew can't survive in a dry environment. There are many ways to do this.
It's often not practical to air a bathroom after every use, particularly if you are dashing off to work and need to leave your home secure with windows shut. But whenever you can, leave a window open immediately after a shower or bath for at least half an hour to let excess moisture evaporate and to air out the room.
If you live in one of the many homes in the UAE that doesn't have windows in the bathroom, make sure to turn your bathroom extractor fan on whenever possible. Check that your fan is working efficiently. If your fan is old or if the room is damp even with the fan on, it might be time to consider a newer, more powerful model.
If your home is a new build, be aware that a cheap and ineffective fan might have been installed, so shop around and consider upgrading to a pricier and more powerful one.
Avoid having very hot steamy showers or baths that can produce excess condensation, and try to shower quickly.
After a shower, allow the shower curtain to air by pulling it fully across the bath - and always dry towels or laundry thoroughly straight after use in a tumble drier or outside if possible.
Keep air conditioning on cooler settings. Cool air contains less moisture than warm air does, so turn your air conditioning down a notch.
Consider getting a dehumidifier to remove excess moisture from the air. Ensure it is safe to use in damp environments such as bathrooms and consult a professional electrician beforehand.
If space or budget is limited, stock up on small moisture-absorbing sachets such as Lakeland's Hanging Moisture Absorbers (Dh70). For a cheaper alternative, fill a jar with bicarbonate of soda crystals and put it on a shelf out of sight to absorb moisture in the air. Keep an eye on it and refill it regularly.
Never use electric fans in a bathroom or wet room, but in other rooms, electric fans can help to tackle the problem by circulating the air.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
The Carousel of Progress Cast
I promised readers that if they were interested in stories about The Carousel of Progress that I would share a few more of them.
Obviously, there are a great many fans of this attraction, as I discovered last December, when I did an hour-long presentation for more than 250 appreciative fans at Disney's Contemporary Resort and then we walked over to the Magic Kingdom and rode the attraction. I always see or hear something new.
For this column, let’s look a little more closely at the characters in the show. Like the rest of you, I am puzzled by the extra younger daughter in Act One and I have no good answer why she doesn’t appear in any of the other scenes—even though the other characters do.
Of course, scenes have changed throughout the years including one of the teenage daughter, called “Jane” in the original versions, on the verge of canoodling with her date on the front porch until mother wisely flicks on the new electric lights. That scene does not exist in the Walt Disney World version and today the daughter is called “Patricia.”
“The actors, well, they are not real people but they are a talented and interesting cast. We call them Audio-Animatronics and they talk and act like human beings,” Walt Disney says with a smile in a 1964 General Electric promotional film for the attraction.
General Electric sponsored the attraction for the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair, because it wanted to clean up its public image. In 1961, the United States Justice Department convicted the company of price fixing and rigging bids, resulting in GE having to pay back millions of dollars, three GE top executives being sent to prison, and several others forced to leave the company. Basically, all GE wanted was a family happily buying lots and lots of GE products as a model for its captive audience.
The Disney Company has always been purposely vague as to whether the story of the attraction represents one family living through several decades or whether it is similar families. There is no indication in any of the scripts or in any of the supplemental material to confirm either assumption.
However, using the same voice for the father throughout the show seems to suggest the audience is watching the same family through the decades. The original concept for The Carousel of Progress was inspired by Thornton Wilder’s stage play, Our Town, that also follows the same characters through the years including courtship, marriage and death.
By now, most people know that the live-action model for the father was actor Preston Hanson. Besides having a “life mask” cast, Hanson sat several times for sculptor Blaine Gibson. The father’s voice was done by Cowboy singer Rex Allen. When his son first saw the attraction at Disneyland, it took until Act Three for the boy to recognize his father.
“That sounds like you but why doesn’t he look like you?” the puzzled teenager asked his father sitting nearby who just shrugged his shoulders.
The arms for the mother and the daughter were originally made from molds of the arms and hands of Imagineer Harriet Burns. She shaved all the hair off her arms and later complained that you never realize how much you miss that hair until it is removed. For many years, she kept extra sets of arms in her basement and used them at Halloween.
The original model for mother, who was a professional artist model, insisted on posing completely nude for Gibson because she knew the difficulty of sketching the human body with even the slightest amount of clothing with creases. Gibson has said that when he sketched her, he became instantly popular with people at the studio constantly coming into his room to check on his phone, the lighting, etc. to make sure everything was working correctly.
The original voice for the mother was supplied by actress Rhoda Williams, who had been the voice of the ugly stepsister Drizella (the brunette) in Disney’s Cinderella.
The son and teenage daughter were based on Disney designer Chuck Myall’s 8-year-old son and 18-year-old daughter, both of whom were interviewed personally by Walt Disney. In addition, Disney Imagineer Richard Irvine’s daughter also posed for the daughter.
Obviously, there are a great many fans of this attraction, as I discovered last December, when I did an hour-long presentation for more than 250 appreciative fans at Disney's Contemporary Resort and then we walked over to the Magic Kingdom and rode the attraction. I always see or hear something new.
For this column, let’s look a little more closely at the characters in the show. Like the rest of you, I am puzzled by the extra younger daughter in Act One and I have no good answer why she doesn’t appear in any of the other scenes—even though the other characters do.
Of course, scenes have changed throughout the years including one of the teenage daughter, called “Jane” in the original versions, on the verge of canoodling with her date on the front porch until mother wisely flicks on the new electric lights. That scene does not exist in the Walt Disney World version and today the daughter is called “Patricia.”
“The actors, well, they are not real people but they are a talented and interesting cast. We call them Audio-Animatronics and they talk and act like human beings,” Walt Disney says with a smile in a 1964 General Electric promotional film for the attraction.
General Electric sponsored the attraction for the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair, because it wanted to clean up its public image. In 1961, the United States Justice Department convicted the company of price fixing and rigging bids, resulting in GE having to pay back millions of dollars, three GE top executives being sent to prison, and several others forced to leave the company. Basically, all GE wanted was a family happily buying lots and lots of GE products as a model for its captive audience.
The Disney Company has always been purposely vague as to whether the story of the attraction represents one family living through several decades or whether it is similar families. There is no indication in any of the scripts or in any of the supplemental material to confirm either assumption.
However, using the same voice for the father throughout the show seems to suggest the audience is watching the same family through the decades. The original concept for The Carousel of Progress was inspired by Thornton Wilder’s stage play, Our Town, that also follows the same characters through the years including courtship, marriage and death.
By now, most people know that the live-action model for the father was actor Preston Hanson. Besides having a “life mask” cast, Hanson sat several times for sculptor Blaine Gibson. The father’s voice was done by Cowboy singer Rex Allen. When his son first saw the attraction at Disneyland, it took until Act Three for the boy to recognize his father.
“That sounds like you but why doesn’t he look like you?” the puzzled teenager asked his father sitting nearby who just shrugged his shoulders.
The arms for the mother and the daughter were originally made from molds of the arms and hands of Imagineer Harriet Burns. She shaved all the hair off her arms and later complained that you never realize how much you miss that hair until it is removed. For many years, she kept extra sets of arms in her basement and used them at Halloween.
The original model for mother, who was a professional artist model, insisted on posing completely nude for Gibson because she knew the difficulty of sketching the human body with even the slightest amount of clothing with creases. Gibson has said that when he sketched her, he became instantly popular with people at the studio constantly coming into his room to check on his phone, the lighting, etc. to make sure everything was working correctly.
The original voice for the mother was supplied by actress Rhoda Williams, who had been the voice of the ugly stepsister Drizella (the brunette) in Disney’s Cinderella.
The son and teenage daughter were based on Disney designer Chuck Myall’s 8-year-old son and 18-year-old daughter, both of whom were interviewed personally by Walt Disney. In addition, Disney Imagineer Richard Irvine’s daughter also posed for the daughter.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
How to Make Hearing Aids “Cool”
Thanks to innovators like the late Steve Jobs, the look and feel of a design is just as important as the technology behind it. Take hearing aids, for example. Most people who need them refuse to wear them because they have a functional appearance that, to the users, implies a defect. The common thought about hearing aids is that “they are for old people.”
Eric Olson, Director of Design at product innovation consultancy Karten Design, explored a new approach for the look of hearing aids with Starkey Laboratories, which develops high-tech hearing aid technology. Together, the two are introducing a line of hearing aids that transcend common stereotypes.
“One of the things we learned,” noted Olson, “is that users have a negative perception of hearing aids. There is still a lot of stigma attached to wearing one. There are more than 35 million people in North America with hearing loss, but only 25% of them wear hearing aids. Despite the amazing technology inside the device, people don't want to be reminded of their age and don't want others to know they have a hearing problem.”
Karten Design was tasked with matching Starkey’s advanced technology with an appealing exterior. The hearing aids needed to be “beautiful in the hand and invisible behind the ear.” The design team handled the first requirement with ease, introducing a stylish form language with complex surfacing.
The curved spine of the S Series features capacitive controls – much like an iPhone touch screen. Users only need a quick swipe of the finger to adjust the device – a much less conspicuous gesture than the fiddling with tiny dials or push buttons.
Making an attractive form visually inconspicuous at the same time presented more of a design challenge, Olson says. The flesh-toned plastic of traditional hearing aids was never quite convincing as skin; older designs arguably advertise hearing loss more than concealing it. Karten Design’s approach was not to match skin tone but instead attempt a sort of camouflage.
“We did a study into what colors and what types of finishes blend the best with hair and skin. We narrowed the options down to several multi-tone metallic finishes, which would pick up the naturally occurring highlights in hair and complement skin tone.”
Karten Design went about its color study digitally. The team started with standard plastic finishes that came pre-mixed in Luxion KeyShot. Designers then tweaked its mix levels to produce a narrow spectrum of custom finish options.
“We did a lot in tuning and retuning of those finishes, making tiny variances in gloss levels or adding metallic flake,” says Olson. “We showed the client a series of renderings of the entire design, each with subtle changes in tone from part to part, which gives the piece an illusion of depth to further mask its appearance.
“It was definitely an unusual exploration of color options. We were tinkering with 17 different colors of silver, three of which are all applied to the model at the same time.”
“This was also the team’s first project using KeyShot, which was well suited to our needs. It was sort of ironic we had just adopted this powerful rendering program, and for our first job we’re using it very intensively on a piece of plastic less than one inch high. We got the sense the software was set up to handle something the size of a car and here we are using it for something the size of a nickel,” says Olsen.
“But just because our hearing aids are small does not mean they were simple. Our automotive-inspired design language introduced taut, precise surfaces and a smooth, sculpted profile. They’re really tailored with a level of detail befitting a product of a much larger scale.”
Automotive-style rendering came in handy not just on constructing finish palettes, but also when assessing the feasibility of manufacture.
“For something this small, we have to tune the tooling for the plastic parts to accommodate even the clear coat and undercoat, because we’re dealing with gaps down to a fraction of a millimeter,” Olson says.
“You can use the rendering process to truly evaluate surfaces and tune surfacing down to this level of precision. In our discussions with engineers, we were able to reference high-resolution images, showing them exactly the kind of detail we needed both in the tooling and the finish.”
For the millions of hearing impaired people, S Series has transformed a stigmatized experience. Hearing aid customers can look at their purchase the same way they would a pair of eyeglass frames.
Eric Olson, Director of Design at product innovation consultancy Karten Design, explored a new approach for the look of hearing aids with Starkey Laboratories, which develops high-tech hearing aid technology. Together, the two are introducing a line of hearing aids that transcend common stereotypes.
“One of the things we learned,” noted Olson, “is that users have a negative perception of hearing aids. There is still a lot of stigma attached to wearing one. There are more than 35 million people in North America with hearing loss, but only 25% of them wear hearing aids. Despite the amazing technology inside the device, people don't want to be reminded of their age and don't want others to know they have a hearing problem.”
Karten Design was tasked with matching Starkey’s advanced technology with an appealing exterior. The hearing aids needed to be “beautiful in the hand and invisible behind the ear.” The design team handled the first requirement with ease, introducing a stylish form language with complex surfacing.
The curved spine of the S Series features capacitive controls – much like an iPhone touch screen. Users only need a quick swipe of the finger to adjust the device – a much less conspicuous gesture than the fiddling with tiny dials or push buttons.
Making an attractive form visually inconspicuous at the same time presented more of a design challenge, Olson says. The flesh-toned plastic of traditional hearing aids was never quite convincing as skin; older designs arguably advertise hearing loss more than concealing it. Karten Design’s approach was not to match skin tone but instead attempt a sort of camouflage.
“We did a study into what colors and what types of finishes blend the best with hair and skin. We narrowed the options down to several multi-tone metallic finishes, which would pick up the naturally occurring highlights in hair and complement skin tone.”
Karten Design went about its color study digitally. The team started with standard plastic finishes that came pre-mixed in Luxion KeyShot. Designers then tweaked its mix levels to produce a narrow spectrum of custom finish options.
“We did a lot in tuning and retuning of those finishes, making tiny variances in gloss levels or adding metallic flake,” says Olson. “We showed the client a series of renderings of the entire design, each with subtle changes in tone from part to part, which gives the piece an illusion of depth to further mask its appearance.
“It was definitely an unusual exploration of color options. We were tinkering with 17 different colors of silver, three of which are all applied to the model at the same time.”
“This was also the team’s first project using KeyShot, which was well suited to our needs. It was sort of ironic we had just adopted this powerful rendering program, and for our first job we’re using it very intensively on a piece of plastic less than one inch high. We got the sense the software was set up to handle something the size of a car and here we are using it for something the size of a nickel,” says Olsen.
“But just because our hearing aids are small does not mean they were simple. Our automotive-inspired design language introduced taut, precise surfaces and a smooth, sculpted profile. They’re really tailored with a level of detail befitting a product of a much larger scale.”
Automotive-style rendering came in handy not just on constructing finish palettes, but also when assessing the feasibility of manufacture.
“For something this small, we have to tune the tooling for the plastic parts to accommodate even the clear coat and undercoat, because we’re dealing with gaps down to a fraction of a millimeter,” Olson says.
“You can use the rendering process to truly evaluate surfaces and tune surfacing down to this level of precision. In our discussions with engineers, we were able to reference high-resolution images, showing them exactly the kind of detail we needed both in the tooling and the finish.”
For the millions of hearing impaired people, S Series has transformed a stigmatized experience. Hearing aid customers can look at their purchase the same way they would a pair of eyeglass frames.
Monday, February 6, 2012
For small families, Hyundai Accent is affordable, stylish
I can't help but smile when I see a child-safety seat in a small car's backseat. I like to think of these folks as rebels proclaiming to the world that having a family doesn't relegate them to a life of minivans. If you also have a desire to buck the system and drive a smaller, more economical car with a child (or two) in tow, the redesigned 2012 Hyundai Accent is an attractive option.
Combined with great fuel economy and a low sticker price, the 2012 Hyundai Accent gives parents an affordable car that doesn't sacrifice style or personality.
Sure, the Accent won't be feasible for many families, rebellious or not. If your family has more than four people, this subcompact won't even be in the running. If you've got older kids, an outing with the entire family might lead to legroom complaints. However, the Accent's size wasn't a problem for my family of three, and it really got me thinking about how I could get used to driving an affordable car.
My hatchback test car with a standard six-speed manual transmission was fun to drive for the first couple of days. I was almost convinced that I could ditch my crossover and become a rebel mom, too, but after taking the Accent on the freeway, I knew I wouldn't be heading to the dealer for a trade-in any time soon. The Accent was responsive and handled well around town while I was running errands, but at higher speeds, it seemed like it would blow off the road at times. I wouldn't go so far as to compare it to a tin can tooling down the highway, but the car did feel lightweight.
The Hyundai Accent comes as both a hatchback and sedan, which has a starting MSRP of $12,445. The base GS hatchback starts at $14,595; my test car, a SE trim hatchback, had a $15,925 sticker price.
With an all-new body style for 2012, the Accent is a real standout in the subcompact class, and it definitely looks more expensive than its price. From my test car's bold Marathon Blue paint to its sporty, fluid styling, this modest five-door is a looker. I could hold my head high when parking in a crowded lot or pulling up to any destination as people surprisingly exclaimed, "That's a Hyundai?"
The five-seater has a low step-in height, making it easy for kids to enter and exit it. Adults will want to watch their heads, though. I'm just 5 feet 4 inches tall and when standing next to the Accent I could see over its roof.
The hatchback body style gave me better access to the cargo area and made loading things like my stroller into the back a little easier, thanks to a deep-set space. Full disclosure: I had to remove one of my stroller's wheels to get it in the back, but it fit along with a couple of grocery bags and a shopping cart seat cover! If I wasn't so lazy, I could've folded the 60/40-split rear seats for even more cargo space.
What I really liked about the Accent was filling up the gas tank for not a lot of cash. Its 138-horsepower, 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine gets an EPA-estimated 30/40 mpg city/highway with regular unleaded gas. Saving money is always a welcome scenario for a family, and it felt great to check the trip computer and revel over the gas mileage I was averaging. Just the fuel economy alone had me thinking about how nice it could be to put an Accent on permanent family duty.
With its low price, you wouldn't expect there'd be much to say about the Accent's interior, but there are a lot of surprises when it comes to its cabin. Hyundai managed to make the inside of this small, inexpensive car look much more spacious and expensive than it really is. Small details such as piano-black surfaces surrounded by silver-painted trim were a welcome sight compared to the usual cheap plastic wasteland usually found in econo-cars.
The Accent's biggest surprise was its roominess. It's still small, but somehow all my passengers riding shotgun with a rear-facing child-safety seat behind them claimed to not feel cramped. There was room for the infant seat without having to pull the front passenger seat all the way forward. This is a considerable feat!
Cupholder enthusiasts should be warned that there are only two in the Accent. Backseat occupants will just have to hold their drinks. In the front row, there's a decent-size upper bin intended to store sunglasses that can be used for other items if you're feeling creative, and the cubby below the center stack can hold a smartphone and lip balm with room for spare change.
Combined with great fuel economy and a low sticker price, the 2012 Hyundai Accent gives parents an affordable car that doesn't sacrifice style or personality.
Sure, the Accent won't be feasible for many families, rebellious or not. If your family has more than four people, this subcompact won't even be in the running. If you've got older kids, an outing with the entire family might lead to legroom complaints. However, the Accent's size wasn't a problem for my family of three, and it really got me thinking about how I could get used to driving an affordable car.
My hatchback test car with a standard six-speed manual transmission was fun to drive for the first couple of days. I was almost convinced that I could ditch my crossover and become a rebel mom, too, but after taking the Accent on the freeway, I knew I wouldn't be heading to the dealer for a trade-in any time soon. The Accent was responsive and handled well around town while I was running errands, but at higher speeds, it seemed like it would blow off the road at times. I wouldn't go so far as to compare it to a tin can tooling down the highway, but the car did feel lightweight.
The Hyundai Accent comes as both a hatchback and sedan, which has a starting MSRP of $12,445. The base GS hatchback starts at $14,595; my test car, a SE trim hatchback, had a $15,925 sticker price.
With an all-new body style for 2012, the Accent is a real standout in the subcompact class, and it definitely looks more expensive than its price. From my test car's bold Marathon Blue paint to its sporty, fluid styling, this modest five-door is a looker. I could hold my head high when parking in a crowded lot or pulling up to any destination as people surprisingly exclaimed, "That's a Hyundai?"
The five-seater has a low step-in height, making it easy for kids to enter and exit it. Adults will want to watch their heads, though. I'm just 5 feet 4 inches tall and when standing next to the Accent I could see over its roof.
The hatchback body style gave me better access to the cargo area and made loading things like my stroller into the back a little easier, thanks to a deep-set space. Full disclosure: I had to remove one of my stroller's wheels to get it in the back, but it fit along with a couple of grocery bags and a shopping cart seat cover! If I wasn't so lazy, I could've folded the 60/40-split rear seats for even more cargo space.
What I really liked about the Accent was filling up the gas tank for not a lot of cash. Its 138-horsepower, 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine gets an EPA-estimated 30/40 mpg city/highway with regular unleaded gas. Saving money is always a welcome scenario for a family, and it felt great to check the trip computer and revel over the gas mileage I was averaging. Just the fuel economy alone had me thinking about how nice it could be to put an Accent on permanent family duty.
With its low price, you wouldn't expect there'd be much to say about the Accent's interior, but there are a lot of surprises when it comes to its cabin. Hyundai managed to make the inside of this small, inexpensive car look much more spacious and expensive than it really is. Small details such as piano-black surfaces surrounded by silver-painted trim were a welcome sight compared to the usual cheap plastic wasteland usually found in econo-cars.
The Accent's biggest surprise was its roominess. It's still small, but somehow all my passengers riding shotgun with a rear-facing child-safety seat behind them claimed to not feel cramped. There was room for the infant seat without having to pull the front passenger seat all the way forward. This is a considerable feat!
Cupholder enthusiasts should be warned that there are only two in the Accent. Backseat occupants will just have to hold their drinks. In the front row, there's a decent-size upper bin intended to store sunglasses that can be used for other items if you're feeling creative, and the cubby below the center stack can hold a smartphone and lip balm with room for spare change.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
DC Auto Prototype Show
Getting to the DC Auto Show was easy. I drove South on I-95, parked at Greenbelt metro station, then took the green line seven or eight stops to Mt Vernon Square/Convention Center. I walked out of the station into the convention center just as the show opened. Toyota had a Ride & Drive booth near the ticket area, so I scanned my driver's license and quickly found myself getting into a Prius v - which is called an extended hatchback wagon, but just looks like a longer Prius. Kelly, a pleasant young blond woman from Pittsburgh, guided me through starting the motor, and explained the features. Driving smoothly at about ten or twenty mph, we never left battery power. The v is a lot more spacious than the mid-size Prius, but mileage is 44/40 instead of 51/48. Kelly noted that part of the center console separating the driver and passenger seats has been lowered for more legroom, and I noted that the ceiling was more than just a few inches above my head. In my current car, my head touches the ceiling. The car I drove listed for $27,385.
In Toyota's display area, I saw the FCV-R, a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle prototype, and the NS-4, a plug-in prototype intended to include a Human-Machine Interface and all sorts of communications tech - both untouchable on pedestals. The styling of each was more Camry than Prius. More interesting to me was the Prius c, (Aqua in Japan) which looked like a very short Prius. It was only four inches longer than a Yaris/Vitz. It was also a prototype, so the doors were locked, but is due to be released in March 2012. The c/Aqua reportedly gets 64/46 mpg and will be a Super Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle, which is almost as good as the Double Dog Triple Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle. Honest Injun.
Third-generation Priuses start at $24,000 while the Prius plug-in on display had a list price of $32,000. The plug-in hybrid is only available in March in 14 states until next year. For the extra $8,000 dollars, you get MPGe of 87 in EV mode, but 49 mpg in hybrid mode. You'd also want a recharger. Seems like you'd have to do a lot of city driving to recoup that premium.
I crossed through Lexus just as a presenter turned on his microphone and started his spiel. Both his accent and looks reminded me of Jude Law, but Lexus wasn't busy at that moment. Moving to Honda, the popular Fit/Jazz had great visibility, but despite the release of the Jazz hybrid in Japan over a year ago, there is still no Fit hybrid here. The Civic CNG, a natural gas-powered vehicle, was on display, along with the Civic Hybrid and the oft-maligned but popular Insight, but I noticed the Fiat indoor track and ran over to get in line. In front of the track was a classic Fiat 500, a photo opp for enthusiasts.
After another brief e-registration, a slim young brunette woman named Lisa drove me in a Fiat 500 Cabrio through a series of low-speed maneouvres simulating parking and u-turning on city streets. I was comfortable sitting in the car as she noted the bluetooth, wifi and sundry electronic connections. The $16,000 Fiat hasn't been selling well, and they are obviously trying to grab a youthful demographic, the sort who might buy a Kia Soul or Mini Cooper. I could have driven a few more cars, but it felt like speed dating.
I wandered through Audi displays, drooled over the A5 Cabriolet, and saw the front wheel drive Audi A3 e-tron, which has been displayed as both EV and serial hybrid prototypes since 2009. This protoype was an EV with a claimed range of 140 km. The Audi rep, a rather thin woman, said that the e-tron is to be available in 2 to 3 years.
I sat in a few Minis: the Cooper, Clubman and Countryman. Coopers start at $20,000, and are a lot more expensive than Fiats, but seem to have a cachet among city folk that Fiat doesn't. The exterior styling is classic, but the interior styling always makes me think of Dr Who. In my opinion, the style doesn't translate well to the larger Clubman or Countryman.
I love ragtops, but after all their safety advertising, I still find it odd to see Volvo convertibles. Volvo displayed the XC60 plug-in hybrid prototype, a largish crossover utility vehicle. After Volvo was Impossible-land, featuring Bentley, Lotus, Maserati and Ferrari - no hybrids there. I stopped by Mercedes to sit in a Smart Car Cabrio, but I've heard such lousy things about their transmissions that I'm not really a fan.
Volkswagen has always turned to diesels for better mileage, but they did have a display devoted to the Jetta Hybrid, due out in 2013.
I liked the exterior styling of the Kia Optima Hybrid, and its 35/40 mpg is OK, but sitting in the front seat, I was struck by how small the front windshield appeared.
A lot of folk were trying the front seat in the Leaf, so I kept leaving and coming back. There was no Versa hatchback, just a sedan. I still don't like the Juke. Another thin spokeswoman had been driving a dealer Leaf for the past year in LA, and was telling stories about successfully taking longer trips between cities. I said I'm sure everyone asked about range anxiety, but what was the range? She grimaced and said it really depended. If you were running the heater or AC and other devices, or driving at high speeds on the highway it could be 70 or 80 miles. If you were tooling at low speeds in comfortable weather it could be 130 miles. She had the model with cabin AC before the heated seats, steering wheel, etc. were made standard equipment.
In Toyota's display area, I saw the FCV-R, a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle prototype, and the NS-4, a plug-in prototype intended to include a Human-Machine Interface and all sorts of communications tech - both untouchable on pedestals. The styling of each was more Camry than Prius. More interesting to me was the Prius c, (Aqua in Japan) which looked like a very short Prius. It was only four inches longer than a Yaris/Vitz. It was also a prototype, so the doors were locked, but is due to be released in March 2012. The c/Aqua reportedly gets 64/46 mpg and will be a Super Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle, which is almost as good as the Double Dog Triple Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle. Honest Injun.
Third-generation Priuses start at $24,000 while the Prius plug-in on display had a list price of $32,000. The plug-in hybrid is only available in March in 14 states until next year. For the extra $8,000 dollars, you get MPGe of 87 in EV mode, but 49 mpg in hybrid mode. You'd also want a recharger. Seems like you'd have to do a lot of city driving to recoup that premium.
I crossed through Lexus just as a presenter turned on his microphone and started his spiel. Both his accent and looks reminded me of Jude Law, but Lexus wasn't busy at that moment. Moving to Honda, the popular Fit/Jazz had great visibility, but despite the release of the Jazz hybrid in Japan over a year ago, there is still no Fit hybrid here. The Civic CNG, a natural gas-powered vehicle, was on display, along with the Civic Hybrid and the oft-maligned but popular Insight, but I noticed the Fiat indoor track and ran over to get in line. In front of the track was a classic Fiat 500, a photo opp for enthusiasts.
After another brief e-registration, a slim young brunette woman named Lisa drove me in a Fiat 500 Cabrio through a series of low-speed maneouvres simulating parking and u-turning on city streets. I was comfortable sitting in the car as she noted the bluetooth, wifi and sundry electronic connections. The $16,000 Fiat hasn't been selling well, and they are obviously trying to grab a youthful demographic, the sort who might buy a Kia Soul or Mini Cooper. I could have driven a few more cars, but it felt like speed dating.
I wandered through Audi displays, drooled over the A5 Cabriolet, and saw the front wheel drive Audi A3 e-tron, which has been displayed as both EV and serial hybrid prototypes since 2009. This protoype was an EV with a claimed range of 140 km. The Audi rep, a rather thin woman, said that the e-tron is to be available in 2 to 3 years.
I sat in a few Minis: the Cooper, Clubman and Countryman. Coopers start at $20,000, and are a lot more expensive than Fiats, but seem to have a cachet among city folk that Fiat doesn't. The exterior styling is classic, but the interior styling always makes me think of Dr Who. In my opinion, the style doesn't translate well to the larger Clubman or Countryman.
I love ragtops, but after all their safety advertising, I still find it odd to see Volvo convertibles. Volvo displayed the XC60 plug-in hybrid prototype, a largish crossover utility vehicle. After Volvo was Impossible-land, featuring Bentley, Lotus, Maserati and Ferrari - no hybrids there. I stopped by Mercedes to sit in a Smart Car Cabrio, but I've heard such lousy things about their transmissions that I'm not really a fan.
Volkswagen has always turned to diesels for better mileage, but they did have a display devoted to the Jetta Hybrid, due out in 2013.
I liked the exterior styling of the Kia Optima Hybrid, and its 35/40 mpg is OK, but sitting in the front seat, I was struck by how small the front windshield appeared.
A lot of folk were trying the front seat in the Leaf, so I kept leaving and coming back. There was no Versa hatchback, just a sedan. I still don't like the Juke. Another thin spokeswoman had been driving a dealer Leaf for the past year in LA, and was telling stories about successfully taking longer trips between cities. I said I'm sure everyone asked about range anxiety, but what was the range? She grimaced and said it really depended. If you were running the heater or AC and other devices, or driving at high speeds on the highway it could be 70 or 80 miles. If you were tooling at low speeds in comfortable weather it could be 130 miles. She had the model with cabin AC before the heated seats, steering wheel, etc. were made standard equipment.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Different cuts from same cloth
Bill Belichick might have written the book on dour, but Tom Coughlin had the market cornered on being square.
If one coach in the NFL looks like a “dark socks and sandals at the beach” type, it’s Coughlin.
He’s always been all business. Glasses. The thinning white hair swept to the side. Fast walker. That air of slight impatience as he rocks side-to-side in press conferences that are long on business, short on laughs.
The guy who long believed five minutes early is on time and four minutes early is actually late doesn’t have a cool, away-from-football alter ego like Belichick does tooling around Nantucket on his boat with Jon Bon Jovi in tow.
So it’s interesting to see the controlling Coughlin not just tolerating his players’ verbal brashness but – in some cases – jumping in himself.
While the Patriots are still name, rank and serial number for the most part under Belichick, the Giants make more guarantees than Bob’s Furniture.
And Coughlin has at times gotten a tad brash himself. Relatively speaking. After the Giants win over the 15-1 Packers at Lambeau Field last month, Coughlin said in the postgame, “I think we’re a dangerous team. I like where we are.”
This week, while Mario Manningham and Victor Cruz have taken turns disparaging Patriots wideout/DB Julian Edelman and Antrel Rolle has been doling out guarantees, Coughlin hasn’t told anyone to dummy up.
Has Coughlin changed?
“Probably, but I think it’s important as the process of learning,” Coughlin said. “You learn, develop, and change every year. You have to bring a fresh approach each year to your team, especially when you’ve been doing it a few years in the same place. If I’ve changed, it’s been an attempt to motivate and put us in the best possible chance that we can be.”
And Coughlin seems to believe that letting his team be itself and forge its own personality is the best way for it to motivate itself. It’s a supremely confident team, especially for a group that went 9-7 and had a four-game losing streak that had them on the verge of missing the playoffs.
But that confidence also allows it to forget about the bumps and then go into Lambeau or San Francisco and win.
Coughlin’s approach is a galaxy removed from the other head football coach in New York, Rex Ryan, who’s willingness to let whatever hits his brain exit his mouth was happily adopted by his players when he joined the team in 2009 and resulted in a 2011 implosion.
But Coughlin does let the players express themselves.
“Players have personalities and they are who they are,” Coughlin noted. “You want a certain amount of that on your football team, but you don’t want someone who puts themselves in a position to hurt your team.”
Coughlin has positive proof that allowing his players to be brash helps them. In 2007, they talked themselves into the notion the Patriots – 18-0 coming into that Super Bowl – were a dynasty that needed to be buried.
They showed up in Arizona dressed in black – a funeral for the dynasty was their reasoning. And they went out and backed up their brashness with one of the greatest upsets in NFL history.
Coughlin’s players say he really isn’t as bad as his reputation.
“My first season I questioned a lot of things that Coach Coughlin was doing,” said Rolle. “After taking a step back and reflecting on all of it, I understand exactly why he is the way he is. I used to always wonder, I felt like he was always trying to turn us into men. Does he not know that we are men before we ever step on the football field here as a Giant? I used to ask myself questions like that. Once I matured enough and I took a step back, he is not trying to turn us into men, he is trying to help us become better men.”
The buy-in from his team is apparent in the way they revere him. After the Giants beat the Patriots in November, they carried him off the field on their shoulders.
“When Coach Coughlin comes up, everybody wants to talk about how rough he is, how unforgiving he is, how the reigns are pulled back pretty tight on the football team, but playing for him is golden for me,” said defensive end Justin Tuck. “You know exactly what to expect from him, you know what he expects from you. It’s easy to go out and do your job when you don’t have to go out and worry about what we are doing here, what are we doing there. I love playing for the guy, and I hope I get to play the rest of my career for him.”
If one coach in the NFL looks like a “dark socks and sandals at the beach” type, it’s Coughlin.
He’s always been all business. Glasses. The thinning white hair swept to the side. Fast walker. That air of slight impatience as he rocks side-to-side in press conferences that are long on business, short on laughs.
The guy who long believed five minutes early is on time and four minutes early is actually late doesn’t have a cool, away-from-football alter ego like Belichick does tooling around Nantucket on his boat with Jon Bon Jovi in tow.
So it’s interesting to see the controlling Coughlin not just tolerating his players’ verbal brashness but – in some cases – jumping in himself.
While the Patriots are still name, rank and serial number for the most part under Belichick, the Giants make more guarantees than Bob’s Furniture.
And Coughlin has at times gotten a tad brash himself. Relatively speaking. After the Giants win over the 15-1 Packers at Lambeau Field last month, Coughlin said in the postgame, “I think we’re a dangerous team. I like where we are.”
This week, while Mario Manningham and Victor Cruz have taken turns disparaging Patriots wideout/DB Julian Edelman and Antrel Rolle has been doling out guarantees, Coughlin hasn’t told anyone to dummy up.
Has Coughlin changed?
“Probably, but I think it’s important as the process of learning,” Coughlin said. “You learn, develop, and change every year. You have to bring a fresh approach each year to your team, especially when you’ve been doing it a few years in the same place. If I’ve changed, it’s been an attempt to motivate and put us in the best possible chance that we can be.”
And Coughlin seems to believe that letting his team be itself and forge its own personality is the best way for it to motivate itself. It’s a supremely confident team, especially for a group that went 9-7 and had a four-game losing streak that had them on the verge of missing the playoffs.
But that confidence also allows it to forget about the bumps and then go into Lambeau or San Francisco and win.
Coughlin’s approach is a galaxy removed from the other head football coach in New York, Rex Ryan, who’s willingness to let whatever hits his brain exit his mouth was happily adopted by his players when he joined the team in 2009 and resulted in a 2011 implosion.
But Coughlin does let the players express themselves.
“Players have personalities and they are who they are,” Coughlin noted. “You want a certain amount of that on your football team, but you don’t want someone who puts themselves in a position to hurt your team.”
Coughlin has positive proof that allowing his players to be brash helps them. In 2007, they talked themselves into the notion the Patriots – 18-0 coming into that Super Bowl – were a dynasty that needed to be buried.
They showed up in Arizona dressed in black – a funeral for the dynasty was their reasoning. And they went out and backed up their brashness with one of the greatest upsets in NFL history.
Coughlin’s players say he really isn’t as bad as his reputation.
“My first season I questioned a lot of things that Coach Coughlin was doing,” said Rolle. “After taking a step back and reflecting on all of it, I understand exactly why he is the way he is. I used to always wonder, I felt like he was always trying to turn us into men. Does he not know that we are men before we ever step on the football field here as a Giant? I used to ask myself questions like that. Once I matured enough and I took a step back, he is not trying to turn us into men, he is trying to help us become better men.”
The buy-in from his team is apparent in the way they revere him. After the Giants beat the Patriots in November, they carried him off the field on their shoulders.
“When Coach Coughlin comes up, everybody wants to talk about how rough he is, how unforgiving he is, how the reigns are pulled back pretty tight on the football team, but playing for him is golden for me,” said defensive end Justin Tuck. “You know exactly what to expect from him, you know what he expects from you. It’s easy to go out and do your job when you don’t have to go out and worry about what we are doing here, what are we doing there. I love playing for the guy, and I hope I get to play the rest of my career for him.”
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Of bad drivers, harmful union stances and too-rich pensions
This is yet another time when several things are popping around in my brain, none ready to materialize as 600 words.
So, without further ado:
Would all you drivers out there who aren’t sure what that handle is that sticks out on the left side of your steering wheel please go back for some remedial driver’s instruction?
It’s called a turn signal and, no, I can’t read your mind when you’re tooling down Columbia Street.
I don’t know that you’re about to turn left unless you actually reach over and move that handy lever to the appropriate position.
That would be down, for those of you who have never used it before.
You might also have someone check your rear lights because an awful lot of you are driving in the evening with those headlights illuminated — and you know that because, lucky you, you’re looking that way — but your rear lights must have burned out back when John Dormer was mayor.
I’m not even going to start on how you merge onto the highway, other than to give you some advice: If you’re terrified you will die just merging, go another way.
I’d like anyone in the Kamloops Thompson Teachers’ Association to send me the releases, pronouncements, letters, whatever your group sent out back when the School District 73 people were talking about creating an international baccalaureate program at NorKam secondary.
I’ve searched the archives for Kamloops This Week and can’t find a single word from any of you expressing your concern about how this new teaching program would be bad for students.
Now, I admit, the archives aren’t the most accurate sometimes, but I would have thought a headline on the KTTA challenging SD73 about this waste of money might be there.
Because, apparently, that’s how the KTTA now views this educational curriculum it is putting into jeopardy by refusing to allow some teachers to take much-needed training for it.
The IB program is simply going to drain away too many resources when these teachers start teaching students the courses, KTTA president Jason Karpuk has said as negotiations to allow for this training have accomplished nothing.
Probably in the same way the school of arts and the science and technology schools have had such a horrible impact on the provision of education in the Kamloops region.
You don’t think you’re hurting students, Karpuk?
Ask them what they think.
I’ve been thinking of taking on Cathy McLeod in the next federal election — just to get a decent pension.
The one I’m looking at, if my most recent statements are correct, doesn’t seem nearly as cool as hers does — and she will only have to work six years to get it.
I started in journalism 39 years ago and, hard as I worked the numbers, I couldn’t find any indexing to inflation.
Don’t even get me started on the total that might be there for me to live on every month.
Nope, gonna run for MP, put in my six years and get out all indexed up.
To all of you who wrote, called or emailed about our dog, many thanks.
I was overwhelmed by the response to that column, one that I wrote as much to help me move past Austin’s sudden illness and demise as it was to share another Street Level moment with readers.
I’ve kept the pictures, the videos, the notes, the sympathy cards — only kept one copy of Rainbow Bridge, however, although I received several.
Just a few weeks later, I still find little bits of dog hair or a toy he had hidden.
I’m still getting used to the fact I can actually leave meat on the counter for a few minutes and it won’t get scarfed down immediately.
Sean still misses his walks with Austin, but a dear friend has offered up her walk-loving dog to fill that void.
So, without further ado:
Would all you drivers out there who aren’t sure what that handle is that sticks out on the left side of your steering wheel please go back for some remedial driver’s instruction?
It’s called a turn signal and, no, I can’t read your mind when you’re tooling down Columbia Street.
I don’t know that you’re about to turn left unless you actually reach over and move that handy lever to the appropriate position.
That would be down, for those of you who have never used it before.
You might also have someone check your rear lights because an awful lot of you are driving in the evening with those headlights illuminated — and you know that because, lucky you, you’re looking that way — but your rear lights must have burned out back when John Dormer was mayor.
I’m not even going to start on how you merge onto the highway, other than to give you some advice: If you’re terrified you will die just merging, go another way.
I’d like anyone in the Kamloops Thompson Teachers’ Association to send me the releases, pronouncements, letters, whatever your group sent out back when the School District 73 people were talking about creating an international baccalaureate program at NorKam secondary.
I’ve searched the archives for Kamloops This Week and can’t find a single word from any of you expressing your concern about how this new teaching program would be bad for students.
Now, I admit, the archives aren’t the most accurate sometimes, but I would have thought a headline on the KTTA challenging SD73 about this waste of money might be there.
Because, apparently, that’s how the KTTA now views this educational curriculum it is putting into jeopardy by refusing to allow some teachers to take much-needed training for it.
The IB program is simply going to drain away too many resources when these teachers start teaching students the courses, KTTA president Jason Karpuk has said as negotiations to allow for this training have accomplished nothing.
Probably in the same way the school of arts and the science and technology schools have had such a horrible impact on the provision of education in the Kamloops region.
You don’t think you’re hurting students, Karpuk?
Ask them what they think.
I’ve been thinking of taking on Cathy McLeod in the next federal election — just to get a decent pension.
The one I’m looking at, if my most recent statements are correct, doesn’t seem nearly as cool as hers does — and she will only have to work six years to get it.
I started in journalism 39 years ago and, hard as I worked the numbers, I couldn’t find any indexing to inflation.
Don’t even get me started on the total that might be there for me to live on every month.
Nope, gonna run for MP, put in my six years and get out all indexed up.
To all of you who wrote, called or emailed about our dog, many thanks.
I was overwhelmed by the response to that column, one that I wrote as much to help me move past Austin’s sudden illness and demise as it was to share another Street Level moment with readers.
I’ve kept the pictures, the videos, the notes, the sympathy cards — only kept one copy of Rainbow Bridge, however, although I received several.
Just a few weeks later, I still find little bits of dog hair or a toy he had hidden.
I’m still getting used to the fact I can actually leave meat on the counter for a few minutes and it won’t get scarfed down immediately.
Sean still misses his walks with Austin, but a dear friend has offered up her walk-loving dog to fill that void.
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