Food Stamps Grow Urban Gardens

Plants and seeds can be purchased with SNAP (formerly Food Stamps, renamed Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP in 2008,) but most current SNAP participants are unaware. Nearly four decades ago, in 1973, Alabama Senator James Allen championed an amendment to allow the purchase of food-producing plants and seeds with Food Stamps. The Senate passed the amendment after less than ten minutes of floor debate. However, in the ensuing decades, there has not been a focused national effort to make SNAP participants raise awareness of this choice that is available to SNAP participants, nor to connect SNAP participants to resources that make gardening a viable with their benefits viable. As of May 2012, nearly than 46.5 million Americans, or more than 1 in 7, 79% of whom are in metropolitan households, depend on SNAP to put food on the table, with an average monthly benefit of $133 per person. Most Americans do not consume sufficient fruits and vegetables, and for SNAP participants, the “triple-A” challenges of access, affordability and awareness are particularly pronounced. Diets with insufficient fruit and vegetable intake can lead to increased incidence of preventable illnesses, such as diabetes and obesity. Those illnesses further increase the burdens of citizens living in poverty. Such burdens fall not only on poor individuals and their families but also on society at large, in the form of Medicare and Medicaid costs. Gardening offers a unique opportunity to simultaneously address access, affordability, and awareness. Gardening can help considerably in providing a healthful diet for SNAP participants in urban areas, while at the same time improving the surrounding neighborhood atmosphere and the natural environment. There are many experiential education lessons to be learned in a garden, including acquiring skills that can be leveraged into new career opportunities. This article will discuss the history of food stamps and gardening as well as current efforts to raise awareness and develop resources to facilitate gardening with SNAP benefits, particularly in urban areas. Because gardeners tend to be the best advocates for gardening, this article will also highlight the role that urban community gardens and community gardeners can play in cultivating awareness and providing support

Implementing RFID Automation into a Small Scale Aircraft Maintenance System

The purpose of this study was to explore and identify where technology automation could be used to reduce time and wasted labor in aircraft inventory and maintenance processes. The research used passive RFID AutoID technology due to its capabilities in data logging and relatively hands-off, passive use. The Purdue University’s aircraft maintenance system operates under old time card systems with paper inspection, check outs of tools, and non-routine inspections, contributing to long search times when looking for maintenance problems or lost inventory that may have happened up to and over a year ago. Furthermore, there are general inefficiencies due to locating forms and filling out paperwork. This study evaluated the effectiveness of RFID technology in an updated process map of tool / part usage, while providing a proof-of-concept RFID-enabled system to track aircraft inventory parts and tools. The study collected information about tool usage and inventory accountability. The use of a database to facilitate this data tracking would have allowed easy access and analysis for maintenance managers to better identify tool use with individual technicians. The solution was to RFID tag a selected test set of specialized aircraft maintenance tools found in the tool room at Hangar 6 in Purdue University’s airport that require check out (as well as aircraft inventory parts), utilize the RFID tunnel and Alien RFID system at Purdue University’s Supply Chain Lab, attach RFID tags to mock name badges, and allow for tracking simply by walking through the door or near the tunnel and checking if the tool was recorded by the RFID reader for that particular person. This resulted in a study of the “before case” process map to the “after case” process map, and whether any steps were removed or added

Gender, Generation, and Abortion: Shifting Politics and Perspectives After Roe

Three months after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the issue of abortion continues to gar­ner widespread public attention. Most Americans are still following news about abortion laws and regula­tions. In fact, they are paying far more attention to the issue than to the 2022 election itself. Over the summer, Gallup found spontaneous mentions of abortion as the "most important problem" facing the country reaching record highs.But after the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision, concerns about abortion have become more politically lopsided. Democrats are far more likely to say the issue is a priority for them, and they are paying much closer attention to news about emerging legislation than Republicans are. Nearly half of Democrats say abortion is critically important to them, while fewer than one in three Republicans say the same. Not only that, Democrats are more likely than Republicans to say they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion—a notable change from the past.At the same time, it's not clear that abortion will define the 2022 midterm elections. Relatively few Americans—roughly one in three—say abortion is a critical issue. Inflation and crime rank much higher among the public's concerns. It is also not clear that young women, who feel most passionately about the issue, will turn out to vote in greater numbers than in the past. And for most Americans, abortion is still one among many important issues on which they will judge a candidate.Still, the Dobbs decision may have an even larger impact in years to come. It may be a distinctive gen­erational coming-of-age moment for many young women, and it may come to define their politics and worldview going forward. Polls show their attitudes on this and other issues are remarkably different from those of other Americans, including young men.Today, no issue is more important for young women than abortion. It ranks higher than inflation, crime, climate change, immigration, gun policy, edu­cation, and jobs and the economy. What's more, young women overwhelmingly say abortion should be legal—including nearly half who say there should be no restrictions on it. Finally, young women are more likely than other Americans to say abortion is a defining issue for their vote

Creating Reliable Software Systems for the DORA CubeSat

The Deployable Optical Receiver Aperture (DORA) CubeSat is a 3U CubeSat that seeks to demonstrate data rates of 1 Gbps over distances of thousands. The DORA technology presents an easy to accommodate optical communications solution for smallsats, which previously was limited by the high pointing accuracy requirement for traditional optical communication systems. We believe this technology to be best suited for surface to orbit communications and the crosslink between small spacecraft, including those in smallsat constellations/swarms

Boston Hospitality Review: Fall 2015

U.S. Lodging Industry Update – Q2 2015 by Daniel Lesser and Jonathan Jaeger of LW Hospitality Advisors® -- Hotel Crowdfunding Grows Up by Joshua Bowman -- Digital Marketing Budgets for Independent Hotels: Continuously Shifting to Remain Competitive in the Online World by Leora Halpern Lanz and Megan Carmichael -- From Patrons to Chefs, a History of Women in Restaurants by Jan Whitaker -- The Bleacher Bar at Fenway Park: Transforming a Former Indoor Batting Cage Into a Unique Eatery and Bar by Graham Ruggie -- Outrageous by Michael Oshin

Healthy Food Access and Affordability: “We Can Pay the Farmer or We Can Pay the Hospital

The authors provide a history and overview of Federal food assistance efforts, especially food supplement programs, and the policy implications for Maine and national nutrition-incentive programs. They present a profile of the work of Wholesome Wave which aims to increase affordability and access to locally-grown food