Trends and Opportunities in Agriculture An Executive Interview with Lowell Catlett

Agriculture will change more in the next decade than it did in the last century. Lowell Catlett is a futurist sharing his knowledge and insight on the new trends and technologies shaping the future of agriculture and how those working in this sector can take advantage of new opportunities.innovation, communication, opportunity, technology, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession, Q10, Q16,

Ways of Forgetting and Remembering the Eloquence of the 19th Century: Editors of Romanian Political Speeches

The paper presents a critical evaluation of the existing anthologies of Romanian oratory and analyzes the pertinence of a new research line: how to trace back the foundations of Romanian versatile political memory, both from a lexical and from an ideological point of view. As I argue in the first part of the paper, collecting and editing the great speeches of Romanian orators seems crucial for today’s understanding of politics (politicians’ speaking/ actions as well as voters’ behavior/ electoral habits). In the second part, I focus on the particularities generated by a dramatic change of media support (in the context of Romania’s high rates of illiteracy at the end of the 19th century): from “writing” information on the slippery surface of memory (declaimed political texts such as “proclamations,” “petitions,” and “appeals”) to “writing” as such (transcribed political speeches). The last part of the paper problematizes the making of a new canon of Romanian eloquence as well as the opportunity of a new assemblage of oratorical texts, illustrative for the 19th century politics, and endeavors to settle a series of virtual editing principle

Spacecraft 2000: The challenge of the future

Considerable opportunity exists to improve the systems, subsystems, components, etc., included in the space station bus, the non-payload portion of the spacecraft. The steps followed to date, the challenges being faced by industry, and the progress toward establishing a new NASA initiative which will identify the technologies required to build spacecraft of the 21st century and which will implement the technology development/validation programs necessary are described

Career-focused Mentoring for Youth: The What, Why, and How?

[Excerpt] When asked to describe an ideal employee, attributes such as being a hard worker, a team player, and a good communicator are frequently cited by employers as being even more important than technical expertise. According, however, to a recent survey of 461 employers conducted by the Conference Board, Corporate Voices for Working Families, the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, and the Society for Human Resources many new entrants to the workforce lack these important skills. These business leaders reported that while the three R\u27s are still fundamental to every employee\u27s ability to do the job, knowledge of applied skills is even more important. (Are They Really Ready to Work? Employers’ Perspectives on the Basic Knowledge and Applied Skills of New Entrants to the 21st Century U.S. Workforce (2006)). One remedy may be found in mentoring. Career-focused mentoring provides young people the opportunity to get a glimpse of the world of work that may not otherwise be available to them. It also allows them to gain and practice skills that are useful in professional and other settings, and to prepare for life as an adult

Science and Theology: A Working Synthesis

Theologians and scientists, working independently, have provided worldviews that lead to questions about the meaning of existence and human life. When these disciplines interact, opportunity exists for more profound insight. Two individuals, Johannes Kepler in the sixteenth century and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin in the twentieth, attempted theological reconstructions based on revolutionary theories of their eras. Informed by a fierce faith in God and a rigorous pursuit of truth derived from the scientific method, their attempts at synthesizing these fields led to results that were unexpected, even unwanted. Yet they provide lessons in the present age for interpretations of the new discoveries and the responsibility of humankind to play an active role in the modern creation story

Science and Theology: A Working Synthesis

Theologians and scientists, working independently, have provided worldviews that lead to questions about the meaning of existence and human life. When these disciplines interact, opportunity exists for more profound insight. Two individuals, Johannes Kepler in the sixteenth century and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin in the twentieth, attempted theological reconstructions based on revolutionary theories of their eras. Informed by a fierce faith in God and a rigorous pursuit of truth derived from the scientific method, their attempts at synthesizing these fields led to results that were unexpected, even unwanted. Yet they provide lessons in the present age for interpretations of the new discoveries and the responsibility of humankind to play an active role in the modern creation story

Can the University of Maine afford to concede to its regional competitors? A 21st century road map for postsecondary language education

The University of Maine Flagship Match program is designed to recruit students from neighboring states and offset enrollment declines. However, language faculty retrenchment at the university a decade ago, combined with the effective double-degree programs with languages, STEM, and other subjects that other regional flagships offer and recent changes in New England’s K–12 graduation options, makes it harder for UMaine to attract high-performing students. If the university wants to compete with others in New England and attract students who focus on global professional issues, it has an opportunity it cannot afford to miss. Adapting one of the language education models other universities have successfully implemented may be the way to move forward in the twenty-first century, making the University of Maine an important regional player.Accepted manuscrip

The risk-opportunity cleavage and the transformation of Europe’s main political families

Analyses of the last two rounds of general elections in the EU (old) 15 member-states, as well as of the 1999 and 2004 European elections, reveal some of the symptoms of what Key and Burnham called "critical elections": elections that mark a sudden, considerable and lasting realignment in the electorate, leading to the formation of new electoral majorities. I explore the hypothesis that these series of critical elections at the turn of the century are triggering a radical realignment under the pressures of a new fault-line of conflict aggregation -- one shaped by attitudes to globalization. As a result, an opportunity-risk cleavage is emerging which is challenging, and opting out to replace, the capital-labor dynamics of conflict that have shaped the main political families in Europe over the 20th century. This paper traces the dynamics of realignment in terms of shifts at four levels: 1) The public agenda of political mobilization; 2) The social composition of electoral constituencies 3) the ideological basis of party competition. On this basis, an alignment is taking place, on the one hand between the centre-left and centre-right midpoint around an "opportunity" pole and, on the other, the circumference of far-right and radical-left parties around a "risk" pole. To what extend will these pressures of realignment manage to unfreeze (in reference to Rokkan and Lipset) the established party-political constellations in nation-states remains to the determined. However, tensions between the analyzed pressures of realignment and existing institutionalized forms of political representation go a long way in explaining the current crisis within both Social Democracy and European Conservatism, as well as the rise of new forms of populism in Europe

Diversity and Transformation: African Americans and African Immigration to the United States

Successive generations of African immigration have continuously transformed the African American community and the sociopolitical climate of the United States.Though the history of African immigration to the United States has at times been a turbulent one, the arrival of many different African peoples has profoundly impacted the social makeup of the United States. During this nation's infancy, hundreds of thousands of captive Africans were delivered to American shores. Overcoming tremendous adversity, this population and its successive generations laid the foundations of opportunity for a new wave of immigration after 1965. From Jim Crow to the Civil Rights Movement to desegregation, African Americans have been instrumental in transforming the sociopolitical climate in the United States, creating an environment far more accepting of new immigrants. A series of post-1965 immigration policy shifts opened the doors to a steady increase in African immigration in the latter part of 20th century. Today, approximately 50,000 Africans arrive annually