News Display: Remembering Dolly, Monday 2/23

The Everett Cafe features thematic news displays on a wide range of educational topics, in addition to daily postings of headlines from around the world. Stay tuned into current events and consider how the news may impact teaching and learning.

• Grand Central Terminal Re-opens, Monday, 2/2


At 12.01 am on Sunday, February 2, 1913, the new Grand Central Terminal, also called Grand Central Station, opened in the heart of New York City, 42nd Street and Park Avenue. It was designed by the architectural firms of Reed and Stern and Warren and Wetmore in the Beaux Arts style. It took ten years to reconstruct the "Grand Central Depot", originally built in 1871. The grade of the rail level was lowered to thirty feet below street level, requiring extensive excavation – an effort that proved indispensable due to the growing commuter population -- further complicated by the demolition of Pennsylvania Station.

After decades of deferred maintenance, extensive use, and abuse (a leaking roof, rusting of structural steel, stained surfaces, crime and homelessness, to name but a few issues), Grand Central underwent major renovations from the late 1980s at the cost of several hundred million dollars. Having achieved landmark status, Grand Central grew to become a beautiful and famed transportation and meeting hub. Its improved functionality and natural beauty supported climate control, hundreds of shops, restaurants, fresh food and produce, arts and crafts, and much more.

How does commuting provide a structure, both solid and subtle, to our daily lives? What does architecture reveal about the dynamics of social interaction and functional necessity? In remembrance of the 1913 re-opening, the Gottesman Libraries will post stories about the building and rebuilding of Grand Central Terminal.


• Celebrating Black History, Monday, 2/9 – Friday, 2/13


February is Black History Month, a time to celebrate the many achievements of African Americans, from abolition and the underground, through to the most recent presidential election. Whether in the field of politics, science, education, business, or the arts, we honor those who have helped shape the history of our nation.

The Gottesman Libraries will feature a Black History display on Monday, February 9, followed by select posters daily. Read excerpts of great speeches; stories about leading educators; a timeline of black history; and much more.


• 100th Anniversary of the NAACP, Thursday, 2/12


On Thursday, February 12th news will highlight the hundredth anniversary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The NAACP was founded on this day in 1909, largely due to race riots in Springfield, Illinois, and growing racial violence across the country. African American leaders joined to form a permanent and highly influential civil rights organization on the 100th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth president of the United States, who led the country through the Civil War to preserve the union and abolish slavery. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is now home to over 400,000 members, and its mission is to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination.


• Greenhouse Effect and Kyoto Protocol, Monday, 2/16


Global warming is a serious threat to the health of our planet, caused by the change in the steady state of temperature in an atmosphere full of gas that absorbs and emits infrared radiation. Although the greenhouse effect was discovered by Joseph Fourier as long ago as 1824, it has reached alarming heights, with significantly greater concentrations of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The first international law calling for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by industrialized nations was adopted in 1997 in Kyoto, Japan at the United Nations Conference on Climate Change. In 2005 the Kyoto Protocol went into effect, with over 140 participating nations, excluding Australia and the United States. It was feared that upholding the protocol would significantly damage business, lessening the power to compete with non participating countries.

An alternative program, the United States Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, was proposed in February 2005 to surpass the proposed Kyoto targets for the United States: greenhouse gas emissions were to be 7% less than 1990 levels over the next six years. An estimated 500 cities signed on to the program, with California taking a lead in aiming to reduce greenhouse gases by 25% by 2020.

What are ways, however small, that you can help limit carbon? What effect does recycling have? What about green technology? Join us as we explore the Greenhouse Effect, the Kyoto Protocol, and the US climate protection program in a selection of news stories.


• Remembering Dolly, Monday 2/23


Dolly, a sheep, was the first mammal ever to be cloned. Born on July 5, 1996, she was created through using a process called Somatic cell nuclear transfer, the work of Scottish scientists Ian Wilmut and Keith Campbell of the Roslin Institute.

Dolly made headlines around the world, causing heated scientific and ethical debates. Under high security, she was locked up at night. She bore six lambs and was eventually euthanized on February 14, 2005, her health failing due to complications of progressive lung disease.

Is cloning moral? How far should science go? Can cloning drive treatments for degenerative diseases, or something worse? These questions and more will be addressed as we feature articles about Dolly, cloning, and the controversial development of modern biology.