Tag Archives: news

Recent News

Music Education Benefits Teenage Students

There have been many studies indicating the positive impact that learning music can have on the cognitive abilities of young children. A new study from a research team led by Nina Kraus of Northwestern University, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that music training, even when begun in the adolescent years, has significant cognitive, emotional, and behavioral benefits for students.

They followed a group of teenage students from low-income neighborhoods around Chicago and tested them just before their freshman year and during their senior years. Nineteen of the students were engaged in musical training and 21 of the students participated in Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps. Testing focused on language skills and sounds. The music group that studied music showed more rapid maturation in the brain’s response to sound and heightened brain sensitivity to sound details, compared to those enrolled in JROTC.

These results could prove valuable when evaluating the need for public school music programs, which are increasingly begun at a later age due to budget cuts.

Recent News

Critic Calls Sale of Classical Stations Unconscionable

South Florida music critic Lawrence A. Johnson called the secret sale of three Classical South Florida (CSF) radio stations unconscionable and despicable. The stations were sold to a religious broadcaster who immediately switched them to a contemporary Christian format. Former station owner, the Minnesota-based American Public Media Group said the stations were losing money to the tune of $8.93 million in FY 2014. APMG executives were faulted for not announcing that the stations were up for sale, which would have allowed interested parties to buy the stations possibly organize financing to continue the classical format. In fact, Classical South Florida continued to fundraise and gather donations from classical music supporters even though the owners knew the station was close to being sold. Supporters of the former station are asking for an FCC investigation.

Recent News

Trade Deals Need to Work for Workers, not CEOs

 

Even though Congress pulled some last-minute political maneuvering to get Fast Track passed last month—we beat all the odds and changed the game. Despite arm-twisting from corporations and the 1%, Congress nearly defeated Fast Track thanks to pressure that millions of working Americans put on their legislators.

In the coming months, as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—the biggest trade deal in the history of US trade deals—moves forward, Congress will have to vote on it. Working Americans need to stand together to make sure the TPP doesn’t sell out working people here and abroad, give foreign corporations special privileges to sue US taxpayers to recover lost profits, nor undermine efforts to stop climate change.

“We need to carry this momentum forward and tell our lawmakers to focus on policies to raise wages, so millions of working families don’t have to worry about putting food on the table or keeping a roof over their heads. And one way to do that is to ensure that the final TPP is as good for working people as President Obama has said it is,” says AFL-CIO Trade and Globalization Policy Specialist Celeste Drake.

Tell US Trade Representative Michael Froman and President Barack Obama to make trade deals work for working people and not CEOs by signing the petition at: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/trade-deals-must-work-for-working-people.

Recent News

Canadian Steel Workers Victorious Over Crown

Steelworkers who work for Crown Metal Packaging in Toronto, Ontario, have ended their 22-month strike with a new six-year collective agreement. The members of United Steelworkers (USW) Local 9176 will return to work August 10. On July 8, the company finally relented on its attempt to bar striking workers from returning to their jobs. The company had hired replacement workers during the dispute. Not only will all striking workers now have a chance to return to their jobs, but those who choose not to return will be offered enhanced retirement and severance provisions.

“These workers fought for nearly two years against a foreign multinational’s attempt to eliminate their union and their unionized jobs. They received tremendous support from their community and from many allies,” says USW Ontario Director Marty Warren. He thanked the many unions, community groups, and consumers who provided tremendous support, both financial and moral, to the workers and their families.

tom petty
Recent News

Tom Petty Calls Use of Confederate Flag “Stupid”

tom pettyIn a Rolling Stone article Tom Petty of Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) applauded South Carolina for removing the Confederate flag. “Lowering the flag from the statehouse grounds was the right decision. That flag shouldn’t have any part in our government,” he said. The rocker also expressed remorse for his use of the Confederate flag during his 1985 Southern Accents tour.  “I just honestly didn’t give it much thought, though I should have,” he confesses. A couple years afterward, he stopped in the middle of a performance after someone threw a Confederate flag onstage and said: “I would prefer if no one would ever bring a Confederate flag to our shows again because this isn’t who we are.”

His views are in direct opposition to a few others. Michigan-born Kid Rock defiantly told Confederate flag protestors that they could kiss his ass.

Recent News

“Blurred Lines” Round Two

This month US District Judge John Kronstadt rejected arguments over expert witness testimony and jury instructions and denied a bid for a new trial, in the wake of the “Blurred Lines” jury verdict against Pharrell Williams & Robin Thicke. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the judge accepted the Gaye family’s contention that record labels should be held liable for their distribution of a song that was found to be a copy of Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up,” plus ruled rapper T.I. Harris Jr. who contributed a verse on the blockbuster “Blurred Lines” song a copyright infringer. Though the judge denied the family’s request that the song be removed from distribution, he did grant a request for an ongoing royalty rate of 50% of songwriter and publishing revenues. Kronstadt did reduce the damages from $4 million to just under $3.2 million, which reduced the jury’s verdict from $7.4 million to $5.3 million. Williams will now have to turn over about $358,000 in profits, rather than $1.6 million. Next Thicke and Williams will most likely bring the dispute to appeals court.

Recent News

USHLI Offers Scholarship Opportunities

The United States Hispanic Leadership Institute (USHLI) has developed into one of the most powerful, nationally and internationally recognized Latino organizations in the country by organizing and conducting nonpartisan voter registration and leadership development programs in 40 states. The organization also offers a wide variety of scholarships targeted at Latino students. For more information visit www.ushli.org.

Recent News

NLRB to Rule on Postal Services at Staples Stores

In August the National Labor Relations Board will rule whether the Postal Service violated its collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with the American Postal Workers Union (APWU) by outsourcing post office services to Staples stores. Typically, Staples’ employees earn about one-third as much as the average post office employee. APWU contends that the Postal Service violated the CBA by illegally subcontracting the work without negotiating with the union.

Recent News

UFCW Canada Members Ratify Loblaw Contract

United Food and Commercial Workers of Canada Local 1000A voted to ratify an agreement with Loblaw Companies Ltd. Ratification of the agreement, which covers approximately 12,000 workers in 60 Loblaws Great Food and Superstore locations across Ontario, avoided a planned strike. Among highlights of the agreement were job assurances for full and part-time workers, prescription drug cards for full and part-time employees that meet eligibility requirements, protection of the defined benefit pension plan, scheduling improvements, and annual wage increases.

Recent News

SEIU Explores Strategies to Organize Fast Food Industry

Up till now the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) efforts to organize America’s fast food workers are blocked by the fact that most of them (including 700,000 McDonald’s workers) are employed by franchises. Therefore, the union cannot legally negotiate a contract with the corporation that owns the brand name. SEIU says their two strategies for working towards fast food worker organization are: try to get the National Labor Relations Board and courts to rule that fast food companies exercise so much control over their franchisees that they are effectively joint employers, and to use publicity to pressure fast food corporations to order franchisees to treat their workers better.