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There are nearly 5,000 charter schools across the country. They educate more than 1.5 million students. And President Obama wants more. But do they work? There are a handful of charter schools in wealthy communities and, perhaps not surprisingly, they tend to have high test scores. But most charter schools are in low-income, often minority neighborhoods. How do they fare? WBHM’s Tanya Ott has our report.

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90.3 WBHM is Birmingham’s public radio station. You can visit their website at wbhm.org.

The Student Association for Graduate Education (SAGE) is looking for volunteers to participate in this year’s TAP Project. The UNICEF TAP Project is a nationwide event that takes place during World Water Week, March 21-27. During that week, participating restaurants ask patrons to pay $1 for the water they would normally get for free.

According to UNICEF, all funds raised support UNICEF’S water, sanitation and hygiene programs aimed at bringing clean water to children around the world. The project started in New York City in 2007, but last year SAGE recruited local restaurants to participate in the event.

“Last year, we had 17 restaurants participate, and as a city we raised $3,570,” said SAGE member Meg Davis.

Participating restaurants included Rojo, Highland Bar and Grill, Becky’s South and Cosmo’s Pizza.

Davis said the group started late last year, and this year they hope to recruit more restaurants and raise more money by starting earlier.

“The biggest problem last year was not enough people knew about it. This year we hope to raise awareness on the campus and across the city,” said Davis.

In order to raise awareness, SAGE hopes to have more volunteers help with the project. According to Davis, volunteers have the opportunity to participate as little or much as they want.

“We have three different things to do, and volunteers can choose their level of involvement,” said Davis. “The three things they will be doing are restaurant recruiting, community awareness and event planning.”

If interested, volunteers are encouraged to attend one of two interest meetings Wednesday, Feb. 10 from noon to 12:30 p.m. or from 5:30 to 6 p.m. in the Ryals Building room 234.

For the Birmingham portion of the project, this year’s theme is “H20 for Haiti: the Birmingham TAP Project.”

All the money raised locally will go to the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, which will then donate the money to countries around the world prioritized according to their immediate need.

Davis said SAGE chose the TAP Project for many reasons.

“Last year we wanted to do something here in Birmingham that would have an international effect,” she said. “Several of us in the School of Public Health have an international interest, so we’re trying to do what we can here to help there while we’re still in school.”

According to UNICEF, $1 provides a child with clean drinking water for 40 days, which is important considering there are nearly 900 million people worldwide who lack clean access to water, about half of which are children.

For more information, students are encouraged to attend one of the information meetings, visit http://www.tapproject.org or email Meg Davis at megdavis@uab.edu.

Two candidates, Jake Jones and Brad Watts, are running for president of the Undergraduate Student Government Association (USGA) in this year’s election.

Brad Watts, a political science and history major with junior class standing, is currently a senator for the division of general studies and the internship coordinator in the executive cabinet. Watts said he decided to run after beginning his second term as senator.

“I really liked the work I was doing,” he said. “I was starting to get involved in writing legislation, realizing that my legislation could actually have an effect. I like being able to affect the university and bring about change.”

According to Watts, there is not one main issue affecting all students because “different issues affect students differently.”

He does believe some of the main issues affecting students are parking, on-campus housing and Greek housing. He plans to address all three if elected.

Watts plans to advocate for the expansion of residence halls, look at Greek housing and lowering parking fees, while also looking to add and expand current parking.

“There are times I can’t even find parking, and I’m a resident. It’s not just about adding to what we have, it’s also about expanding. But the first step is lowering fees to students,” said Watts.

Watts also wants to work on forming a student loan program and look at building a student union.

“A student union is basically a building that is owned, operated and run by students. It differs at each university. Oftentimes, it will have stores, meeting spaces, restaurants, theaters — things that cater just to students. It is essentially like the HUC, but there are no administrative offices,” he said.

According to Watts, a student union has been proposed and is on the blueprint for the campus green, but nothing has been done since.

Watts believes he is the best candidate for the job because of his involvement in many organizations.

“In addition to my USGA experience, I have experience with different student groups — Pi Kappa Phi Fraternity, Trailblazers, International Mentors, Orientation Leaders — so I feel like that breadth of experience allows me to connect to a bunch of different students. I understand different perspectives,” said Watts.

Jake Jones, who is also running for president, is a biology major with junior class standing.

Jones said he decided to run because he wants to help create positive changes at UAB.

“I want to see changes that don’t just fulfill my agenda but help the students as a whole,” said Jones.

Jones believes one of the biggest issues affecting students is the cost to attend the university and hopes to address that if elected.

“We all know that tuition is going to continue going up; we’re going to keep getting proration for years to come. There’s not much that I can do about controlling that. There’s not much that the university can do about controlling that, so I plan to cut costs elsewhere,” said Jones.

“The way that I plan to go about that is to look at extraneous costs students pay other than tuition including dining fees, building fees, etc. to see what I can cut out of that,” Jones added.

If elected, Jones also wants to look at improving campus facilities, namely the Arts and Humanities Building and the Education Building.

“When the facilities can’t keep up with the current classrooms, I see that as a problem to students. They don’t accommodate the size; they don’t accommodate the needs,” said Jones.

“We have $9 million from the installation of the College of Arts and Sciences, so we have that to work with,” Jones added.

Jones believes he is the most qualified candidate because of his leadership abilities and dedication.

“I am a senator. I am a resident advisor in Blount Hall, and I am also an associate member of Alpha Epsilon Delta, the pre-health society,” said Jones.

“I definitely have good leadership abilities, I think that’s my strong suit, and also, I am a hard, hard worker. I think that shows a lot in my classes because I’m not necessarily the smartest student or the best student in class, but I always try to work hard enough to make the grade,” Jones added.

The elections will be held Feb. 23-24. Students can vote at campus-wide polling places or on Blazernet.

Heather Caygle

News Editor

Mobile phones are many things to different people, but a Milwaukee technologist and entrepreneur hopes to turn yours into a ticket to a party, club or concert through Twicketer.com. Continue Reading

WASHINGTON — A feisty but occasionally frustrated President Barack Obama tried Wednesday to calm nervous Senate Democrats about their political futures and prospects for passing major legislation, as he urged them to keep pushing hard for solutions to the nation’s most vexing problems. Continue Reading

WASHINGTON — Congressional investigators are escalating their probe of Toyota Motor Corp. vehicles by examining whether sudden acceleration afflicts models that have not been recalled — and whether all Toyota vehicles should be modified so that their brakes override out-of-control throttles.

The increased scrutiny comes as regulators in Japan and the U.S. have launched inquiries into reports that brakes on the company’s Prius hybrid are slow to respond. A Prius controversy would be particularly thorny for Toyota, which has used the hybrid to hone its image as a maker of environmentally friendly and technologically advanced autos.

“The Prius is their poster child for corporate responsibility,” said Jeremy Anwyl, chief executive of auto research firm Edmunds Inc.

Also Wednesday, Toyota dealers in Southern California began receiving parts to fix sticky gas pedals, which the automaker has blamed for some of the sudden-acceleration problems, and a California legislator said he would propose that state lawmakers stop buying Toyotas for their vehicle pool.

Toyota’s stock plunged after Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, in a congressional hearing, appeared to warn owners not to drive recalled vehicles. LaHood later said he misspoke. He meant to caution people to avoid operating vehicles that have exhibited a rough or sticky gas pedal and recommended that owners get their cars fixed quickly.

The chairman of a congressional committee that plans a hearing on the recall next week sent a letter to Toyota Wednesday asking whether it was safe to drive recalled models and whether the sudden acceleration problems affect other Toyota vehicles.

Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, asked about similar problems in the Toyota Tacoma truck. He said the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has received more than 100 complaints about sudden acceleration in the Tacoma, which does not have the same accelerator pedal assembly as the recalled models.

The Los Angeles Times reported Nov. 29 that the average number of sudden acceleration complaints involving the Tacoma increased dramatically after Toyota introduced electronic throttles on the truck in 2005. Towns also cited some complaints in which faulty floor mats, which sparked a Toyota recall last year, did not appear to be the cause.

“What would explain episodes such as this, where drivers are experiencing an uncontrollable acceleration and, reportedly, no floor mats are present in the vehicle (or they reported the floor mat was not involved),” Towns wrote.

Toyota said last year that it will install a brake override in vehicles it has recalled to prevent the risk of floor mats entrapping the gas pedal; Towns asked whether Toyota was considering installing override on all its vehicles.

Rep. John D. Dingell, D-Mich., asked Toyota why the automaker’s recall announcements came “at least two years” after it had learned of sudden acceleration problems.

He also asked about a Nov. 8 Los Angeles Times article reporting that Toyota “did not disgorge” all of the complaints about sudden accelerations problems it knew of when the data was requested by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

LaHood said that the NHTSA “will continue to hold Toyota’s feet to the fire to make sure that they are doing everything they have promised to make their vehicles safe. We will continue to investigate all possible causes of these safety issues.”

LaHood said he intended to speak directly with Toyota President Akio Toyoda “very soon” to make sure the company gets the message from the U.S. government that the company needs to take aggressive action to resolve the sudden acceleration problems.

“This is serious. This is very serious,” LaHood said. Toyota is doing everything now to correct the problem, he added, “but we’re going to keep the pressure on them.”

Toyota said Wednesday that unless people are experiencing problems with their vehicle, the autos are safe to drive.

“Our message to Toyota owners is this: If you experience any issues with your accelerator pedal, please contact your dealer without delay,” the company said in a statement. “If you are not experiencing any issues with your pedal, we are confident that your vehicle is safe to drive.”

The company began fixing the recalled vehicles Wednesday.

Keyes Toyota in Van Nuys, Calif., said it planned to fix between 30 and 50 Camrys and Corollas as well as some cars in the dealership’s inventory. Roughly 6,000 to 8,000 customers in the area are affected by the recall, said service director John Williams.

The pedal fixes began as new problems with the Prius surfaced.

In Japan, the Transport Ministry said it has received 14 complaints about the brakes on the new-generation Prius, which was introduced last year.

Complaints about Prius brakes could be an issue with people’s unfamiliarity with the feel of some hybrid braking systems, which take the energy from braking and cycle it back into the drivetrain, said Rebecca Lindland, director of the autos group for IHS Global Insight, an economic forecasting firm.

Toyota’s massive recall might have made Toyota owners more sensitive to perceived glitches, she said.

“Brakes do feel differently in a hybrid because of the regeneration process. People need to recognize that these brakes sometimes feel different,” Lindland said.

Daniel Yaghoubzadeh, a San Diego law school student, said he has had problems with a leased 2010 Prius.

“Shortly after I realized that the car sometimes accelerates when I depress the brake pedal instead of slowing down, I took the car into the service department. … They pretty much didn’t believe me,” he said.

The cascading recalls and probes are starting to take their toll on Toyota.

“Toyota seems acutely vulnerable to this because of the very essence of the brand which is reliability durability and quality. This goes to the heart of that reputation,” said Anwyl of Edmunds.

Toyota shares closed Wednesday at $73.49, down $4.69, or 6 percent. The stock has lost 20 percent of its value since the Jan. 19 sticky gas pedal recall, representing a $30 billion loss in market value.

In another development, California state Assemblyman Ted Lieu, a Democrat, said he will ask the Rules Committee Thursday to re-institute a “Buy-American” policy when purchasing pool vehicles that the house’s 80 members use to get around Sacramento.

“With the massive safety problems that Toyota is experiencing, I think it’s an appropriate time to back to the Buy-American policy,” he said.

Lieu’s district is home to Toyota’s North American sales headquarters.

MCT

And now for a slice of news from public radio…

Each Friday during the legislative session, WBHM’s Bradley George speaks with an Alabama lawmaker

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90.3 WBHM is Birmingham’s public radio station. You can visit their website at wbhm.org.

FRESNO, Calif. — Most college students get their first hard lesson before setting foot in class: a crash course in economics delivered by the campus bookstore, where textbooks cost hundreds of dollars.

Now, students at California State University, Fresno, can catch a break. Through a new program, at least 80 percent of textbooks at the Kennel Bookstore are available for rent.

Campus officials say students could save as much as 75 percent off the cover price — a more budget-friendly option for those struggling with college costs.

The partnership between the bookstore and chegg.com, an online textbook rental company, is a sure sign of change within the market. Beyond buying new or used textbooks, today’s students can rent textbooks or buy “ebooks” — electronic versions downloaded to a computer.

Experts say “ebooks” aren’t in widespread use; Fresno State offers only about 200 titles. But rental programs are growing online and on campuses.

Barnes & Noble College Booksellers, which runs more than 600 college bookstores, last week announced it will expand a pilot rental program to more campuses — including the College of the Sequoias in Visalia. Follett Higher Education Group, which operates more than 700 bookstores, said it will broaden its rental program to hundreds of campuses for the 2010 academic year.

The process is simple. Students figure out the books they need for the semester, then pick up rentals at the bookstore or place an order through an online company. Those companies ship the books to students, who send them back at the end of the semester.

A spokesman for the National Association of College Stores, which represents more than 3,100 collegiate retailers, said rentals are an emerging trend.

“Students are getting increasingly creative in their purchases of course material,” said Charles Schmidt, a spokesman for the association based in Oberlin, Ohio.

“There are more options out there — and competition.”

Schmidt said about 200 of the association’s retailers offer rentals; he expects that will rise to about 1,000 as companies like Follett roll out programs.

For bookstores, the drawbacks to rentals have been the cost of buying and storing books and the prospect that a professor could drop a title before the upfront cost is recovered, Schmidt said.

Today, stores often rent only a fraction of their inventory. Last semester, for example, Fresno State’s Kennel Bookstore had four textbook titles for rent, said Susan Bartel, book department manager.

The bookstore’s new program is unique because of its breadth. Bartel said 80 percent to 85 percent of its 2,500 textbooks are available through chegg.com, a Santa Clara-based company named for the classic chicken-or-egg conundrum.

Through the partnership, chegg.com gets more direct access to Fresno State students. The bookstore gets a small commission from chegg.com. And students get another option for textbooks.

Nathan Schultz, chegg.com’s vice president of supply chain management, said the program allows the bookstore to offer rentals without sinking millions of dollars into inventory. If the university drops a book, he said, chegg.com will find another market for it.

Schultz called renting “by far the cheapest option.” On average, Bartel said, students should save about half the price of a new book.

Schmidt and others said renting isn’t for everyone, however. Some students may prefer to keep books, need course material that may not be packaged with a rental or simply want cash from selling a book at the end of the semester, he said.

Textbook publishers have set up some obstacles. Ron Durham, director of the Kennel Bookstore, said companies are changing editions more often and packaging textbooks with other material — such as a Web site access code — that only can be used once.

Publishers also are creating more custom textbooks — books tailored to a professor’s specifications, he said.

“Publishers have been fighting quite some time against used books, and they’re doing the same thing with rentals,” Durham said.

At the Kennel Bookstore, chegg.com computer kiosks allow students to find and price textbooks. Officials say ordering through a bookstore helps assure a student is getting complete and correct course materials.

Rental prices can fluctuate based on supply and demand. This week, chegg.com representatives also offered discounts to students ordering in the store.

Durham said more rentals will mean fewer sales. He didn’t have any estimates of how the program may dent the bottom line, but said the store wanted to expand rentals to respond to students clamoring for more and cheaper choices.

According to the National Association of College Stores, the average retail cost of a new textbook is $57. Students spend about $670 annually on required course materials.

The numbers trend higher in California. A 2008 report from the state auditor said full-time students at CSU campuses spend $812 annually on textbooks.

Jessica Sweeten, president of Fresno State’s Associated Students Inc., said textbook prices are a chronic complaint. She called the bookstore’s new program “a huge step for students.”

While some may prefer to keep books in their major, renting is a good solution for those “who just need the book to get through a semester,” Sweeten said.

Freshman Corey Souza, 18, of Turlock rented his biology book — $37, compared to $93 for the used version — for just that reason.

“It was substantially cheaper, and I don’t plan on keeping the book,” said Souza, who spent $500 last semester on textbooks.

Junior Craig Parks, 20, of Lemoore said he only has a few rental options this spring. Many textbooks for his business major come with supplemental material — which means buying them new, he said.

But Parks likes having more choices: “I certainly see textbook rental as the most realistic solution to textbook affordability.”

WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, his predecessor Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke denied Wednesday any wrongdoing in secretive decisions surrounding the September 2008 bailout of failing insurance giant American International Group.

Geithner, right hand raised in a swearing-in ceremony, appeared before a hostile House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform to answer questions about the decision to settle at face value $62 billion in exotic bets made by Wall Street investment firms such as Goldman Sachs and foreign banks without negotiating a discount for taxpayers.

Committee Republicans in recent weeks forced the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to release e-mail records, which give the appearance that staffers were directing officers of AIG, by then under government control, to withhold information about these payments from the Securities and Exchange Commission and thus AIG shareholders and the public.

This has led many Republicans, who held the White House during the AIG rescue, to charge that the New York Fed, then headed by Geithner, engaged in a cover up of controversial aspects of the bailout. Geithner on Wednesday strongly denied that.

“The steps that were taken were motivated solely by what we believed to be in the public interest. We did not act because AIG asked for help,” Geithner said during his opening remarks.

But in his opening statement, and in longer written remarks, Geithner cast the controversial payments in the broader context of rescuing the financial system and attempting to maintain investor confidence in AIG, whose federal support eventually grew to $182 billion.

Had AIG filed for bankruptcy, it could have brought a collapse of global finance because of its business lines across the planet, Geithner said. Allowing AIG to default on its insurance-like exotic bets called credit-default swaps would have undermined confidence in the company and U.S. financial markets more generally.

“We could not credibly threaten not to pay. That meant putting AIG into bankruptcy. At the time, we were working desperately to rebuild confidence in the financial system,” he said in written remarks. “Any suggestion that we might let AIG fail would have worked against that vital aim. We could not risk a protracted negotiation.”

That meant Goldman Sachs, sometimes dubbed Government Sachs because so many of its executives end up in government posts, received $12.9 billion to settle its bets with AIG. And foreign banks like France’s Societe General and Germany’s Deutsche Bank each received almost $12 billion.

“I think our commitment to Goldman Sachs trumped the responsibility that our officials had to the American people,” Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., shouted at Geithner.

Most committee Republicans didn’t buy the secretary’s explanation either.

“We’re not getting the whole story, we’re getting a lame story,” said Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., who asked Geithner why he didn’t just resign.

Getting personal, Mica brought up the issue that nearly scuttled Geithner’s nomination to head the Treasury Department, his failure to pay self-employment taxes.

“You gave a lame excuse then, you’re giving a lame excuse now,” Mica said. Geithner responded by saying he is a career public servant and has “never been a politician,” insinuating that Mica was grandstanding.

As to the charge of a cover up, Geithner noted that many of the controversial decisions about disclosure about paying off at full value those on the other end of exotic bets with AIG came after he was nominated on Nov. 24 to be treasury secretary. He was asked to remain on as president of the New York Fed but removed himself from day-to-day policy issues such as the AIG payments.

“I personally played no role,” Geithner said in a spirited question-and-answer session.

Lawmakers have called the AIG payments to Wall Street firms a backdoor bailout using taxpayer money to shore up the very firms whose risky behavior sunk the U.S. economy into the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

“That played no role in our decision,” Geithner insisted.

If Geithner was not involved in making the decisions, then the ultimate responsibility rested with Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, whose nomination for a second four-year term has been made more challenging because of the AIG fallout.

In a letter released Wednesday to the committee’s top Republican, California Rep. Darrell Issa, Bernanke offered a more nuanced answer to whether the health of Wall Street banks played a role.

“Because of its concerns about the stability of the financial markets during this period, the Federal Reserve was monitoring the financial condition of major banking and investment banking participants in the markets, which included many firms that were not counterparties (to AIG’s exotic bets) and some that were,” Bernanke wrote.

The idea, said Bernanke, was to halt the investor drain on AIG’s reserves, not protection of a few banks.

“Whether the individual counterparties were in relatively sound financial condition or not was not a factor in the decision regarding the amount paid to the counterparties or whether concessions should be sought from them,” he wrote.

In written remarks made public before he testified, former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said he had “limited knowledge on the topic of immediate interest to the committee.”

A former CEO of Goldman Sachs before heading the Treasury Department, Paulson defended the rescue of AIG but in his written remarks made no reference to his many phone calls to his successor at Goldman, Lloyd Blankfein, during the turbulent month of September 2008.

MCT

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Today is two months on the job for Freida Hill. She is the new chancellor of Alabama’s two year college system. Hill spent 18 years working for Georgia’s technical colleges. But in Alabama she steps into a system facing increased enrollment with shrinking budgets, plus lingering fallout from a corruption scandal. Hill spoke to WBHM’s Andrew Yeager about some of those issues as well as her goals for the state’s two year college system. She says she wants to improve the transition for students who transfer from a two year school to a four year school.

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90.3 WBHM is Birmingham’s public radio station. You can visit their website at wbhm.org.