The New York Times has a piece today on a RI Training School program that puts juvenile offenders to work restoring old New England diners through the New Hope Diner Project. The youths restore the diners’ decrepit buildings, work the griddles and cash registers, and will (eventually, hopefully) manage the actual businesses sometime in the future. Pam Belluck writes:

“The whole poetry behind it is that these are kids who have been pretty much cast away emotionally and criminally, getting a chance to restore beloved eateries that have been cast off from society, too,” said Daniel Zilka, the acting director of the American Diner Museum, who rescues decrepit diners and helps run the project. “If they continue on the path that they’ve been moving upon they would end up in an adult correctional facility. This is probably their last opportunity.”

The offenders at the detention center, some as young as 13, have been convicted of crimes like sexual assault, armed robbery, breaking and entering, and drug offenses, and sentenced to serve 6 to 18 months. The center, the Rhode Island Training School, also has maximum security for offenders including murderers, but offenders qualify for the project only if they behave well enough to move to the regular detention population. They must also have, or nearly have, a high school equivalency diploma.

Work release is an important reentry mechanism for many offenders, but should these youths be encouraged to spend their time studying and developing more general skills before jumping into this line of work? Or do programs like this create order, stability, and options for young people with seemingly no way out?

UPDATE: Footage, courtesy of the Greenwash Gorillas themselves… even as this was a pretty amazing spectacle, the footage kind of makes me want to give Tom a big hug. While I understand the criticisms of Friedman’s work, I wonder if this was an effective way to get the message across, or whether this merely reflects poorly on the University… thoughts? Could the pie-throwers have raised their dissent during the Q&A with as much flair?

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman had just begun his Earth Day lecture at Brown last night, when Molly Little ‘08.5 and a colleague let him know what they thought of his work. The Brown Daily Herald reports:

A female audience member ran on stage last night and threw a green pie at New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman […]. The woman had been sitting in the south side of the auditorium’s front row when she pulled the pie out of a Brown Bookstore plastic bag that had been tucked in a red backpack and leapt out of her seat.

(more…)

Ladies and gentlemen, Bill Clinton:

“I think there is a big reason there’s an age difference in a lot of these polls,” said Bill. “Because once you’ve reached a certain age, you won’t sit there and listen to somebody tell you there’s really no difference between what happened in the Bush years and the Clinton years; that there’s not much difference in how small-town Pennsylvania fared when I was president, and in this decade.”

While nobody has suggested that there was “no difference” between his Presidency and George W’s, and while, in fact, on trade and economic issues Bill was perfectly happy to GATT it up with NAFTA, China Free Trade, etc, that’s not even the point here. In an increasingly disturbing campaign season, there have been few more obnoxious assertions than those, from the Buffenbargers of the world, for example, claiming that Obama’s supporters are just a bunch of wide-eyed college students, as if his ability to energize young voters (of both genders, in addition to a coalition broad enough to have him winning the popular vote and the delegate count thus far) means that he is somehow insubstantial or even dangerous.

The idea that young voters are somehow scary or threatening is boomer dog-whistle politics, conjuring memories of counter-culture turmoil despite the reality of Gen Y/Q’s commitment to service and change, and relative lack of interest in 20th century-style revolution. It’s another pile of political doody from the mouth of eminence-turned-hack Bill. And it’s part of a strategy that will end up leaving the Democrats looking like Carthage in the wake of the general. (more…)

What are Rhodies? People from the short-lived Republic of Rhodesia?

Anyway, if by “Rhodies” the Brown Daily Herald means “Rhode Islanders” then good on Brown.

The state is the 43rd most populous in the country, but the fifth most common home-state for the class of 2011. About 4 to 6 percent of Brown students hail from the Ocean State, despite the state accounting for only one-third of 1 percent of the country’s population, according to the Office of Institutional Research and the U.S. Census Bureau.

Do Rhode Island applicants have a home-field advantage?

“All other things being equal,” Dean of Admissions James Miller ‘73 said, “being from Rhode Island will tip the balance towards that applicant.”

Miller, who said there is no policy, formula or quota concerning Ocean State applicants, compared the advantage of being a local resident to that of a top legacy applicant. “We feel an obligation to the state, and students and families from the state,” he said.

“We want to be good citizens of the state, to educate the best students from the state,” he added.

This helps explain why they have coffee milk in the dining halls. (more…)

The 28th annual juried Student Exhibition, sponsored by the Bell Gallery and the Department of Visual Art runs to March 30th. There’s some very cool stuff here… I particularly liked the cast glass sculpture by Paul Wallace. Also, when you walk into the second ‘room’ look up. An installation by Jesse Cohn hovers above and is subtle in the extreme. Cohn has strung yards of microfilament from geometric grids of push pins creating a nearly invisible shimmer that catches the light and casts faint shadows aginst the white walls. It’s almost nothing at all.

The Reject Show is on display in the areas outside the gallery proper.

Take a break from getting waste off green beer to come out and see “Iraq for Sale: the War Profiteers”, which will be kicking off Providence Students for a Democratic Society’s anti-war Week of Action during this the week of the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War. It starts at 7:30 at MacMillian Hall, Room 115 (on Thayer between George and Waterman) on Brown’s campus. It sounds pretty cool:

The story of what happens to everyday Americans when corporations go to war. Acclaimed director Robert Greenwald ( Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, Outfoxed) takes you inside the lives of soldiers, truck drivers, widows and children who have been changed forever as a result of profiteering in the reconstruction of Iraq. Iraq for Sale uncovers the connections between private corporations making a killing in Iraq ( Blackwater, Halliburton/KBR, CACI and Titan) and the decision makers who allow them to do so.

Oh and no excuses because admission is free.

Join Providence Students for a Democratic Society, Operation Iraqi Freedom (Brown U’s anti-war group), and others in saying no to five years of imperialist war.

Monday, March 17
Screening of “Iraq for Sale“
7:30 PM at MacMillian Hall, Room 115
(On Thayer between Waterman and George)

Tuesday, March 18
FUNK THE WAR
Student Power Dance Party Against Empire
Dress code: Supah fly.
6:00 PM in Kennedy Plaza
(folks from Brown meeting up to walk down at 5:30 from Faunce Arch)

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As members of the Brown corporation descend on Bruronia’s fair campus for their semesterly meeting this Saturday, join Brown students and our allies in a parade calling for a “More Open and Public Brown.” Festivities start at 10AM:

Education is a Right! Join a Parade, Marching Band, students, and community members to call for:

Grants not Loans!
A Tuition Freeze!
Expanded Finical Aid!
Brown Support for Public Funding of Education!
Expanded Brown Programs for Providence Community Members!

Sponsored by Brown Students for a Democratic Society