Celebrate a Day of Giving -- Dan Giedeman, an SIU Carbondale alumnus, spearheaded the plan for the Balancing Education, Experience & Reality Scholarship. During the 2019 SIU Day of Giving, nearly 1,100 people donated more than $50,000 to create two endowed scholarships. This years Day of Giving is Wednesday, March 4. Last years event raised $911,837 through nearly 3,000 gifts.

February 17, 2020

by Pete Rosenbery

CARBONDALE, Ill. Southern Illinois University Carbondale has spent its 150th anniversary year celebrating its past and looking toward its future. The focus on the future continues with the 2020 Day of Giving on March 4, when university alumni and friends can support a range of programs and initiatives that will move the university forward.

For 150 years, SIU has dedicated itself to higher education excellence and service to the region, state and beyond, said Chancellor John M. Dunn. Since the beginning, the success of the university and its students has been enhanced with the support of alumni and donors, many of whom who found their own success at SIU.

One Vision. 24 Hours

The Day of Giving is the first Wednesday of March to commemorate the universitys Founders Day. The theme for the fourth annual event is One Vision. 24 Hours, said Vice Chancellor for Development and Alumni Relations Rae Goldsmith.

The theme speaks to bringing everyone together for a day in support of a shared vision for the universitys future, said Rae Goldsmith, vice chancellor for development and alumni relations. Throughout the day, friends of SIU are invited to make online donations at siuday.siu.edu to areas of the university that they hold most dear.

A year ago, nearly $912,000 was raised for scholarships, programs and other SIU priorities from nearly 3,000 gifts from 46 states and 10 countries. In three years, more than $1.7 million has been raised.

Media advisory

Reporters, photographers and news crews are invited to attend the fourth annual Day of Giving celebration set for 2 p.m. on March 4 in the first floor rotunda at Morris Library. Chancellor John M. Dunn will be speaking.

Private support for SIU is essential

The 24-hour campaign is a university-wide effort to inspire alumni, students, parents, friends and the larger university community to make a gift to any area of the campus.

Philanthropy has never been more important than it is now, Goldsmith said. This private support helps funds scholarships for students who otherwise might not have access to higher education. Support from philanthropic sources also funds program enhancements and hands-on learning experiences for students.

We hear from many donors that they give because their experience at SIU changed their lives and they want to pay it forward, she continued. Others tell us that they know that SIUs success and the success of the region are closely linked, and they want to invest in the universitys future.

Donors can choose to support more than 150 initiatives and projects, including the Sustainability Green Fund and Saluki Alumni Plaza Project. Those who dont see a particular project of interest listed can select Other and include the name of the program or fund they wish to support in the comments section.

6 a.m. kickoff; giveaways and fun throughout day

The Day of Giving online tickertape begins at 6 a.m. March 4 and will run through 5:59 a.m. on March 5. Giving is tracked at siuday.siu.edu in real time.

Along with the online giving momentum that will build throughout the 24 hours, giving booths will be set up from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on March 4 at the Student Center, Morris Library and a new location, the Alumni Center, in Woody Hall. The booths will feature several giveaways including SIU@150 memorabilia and sunglasses and refreshments from Cristaudos.

In keeping with the one vision theme, virtual reality booths will be set up where visitors can put on headsets and travel across campus and other specific areas in Carbondale. Contributions at these booths will also be logged online.

Challenges, matching gifts are part of the fun

Some donors will challenge others to match their gifts, multiplying the impact of donations. And once again, four traveling trophies will be awarded to both academic and non-academic units based on the largest number of gifts and most dollars raised. Only gifts made on #SIUDAY are eligible for match and challenge opportunities.

The Carbondale in the 80s and 90s Facebook group came together last year to establish the Balancing Education, Experience and Reality scholarship. The group earned a trophy for receiving the largest number of gifts for a non-academic unit with 1,025 donations, while SIU Athletics earned the highest total for most dollars raised with $202,123. The SIU School of Medicine won the academic unit prize for both categories, with 410 gifts totaling $140,299.

Other ways to donate

In addition to online and in-person giving, the donations, which are tax deductible as allowed by law, can be made by calling 618/453-4900 or by sending checks payable to the SIU Foundation to Mail Code 6805, Carbondale, Illinois 62901. If sending a check to the foundation, indicate in the memo that the gift is for #SIUDAY and mark campus unit and the priority you wish to support.

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SIU to celebrate 150 years of success, look to future with the Day of Giving on March 4 - SIU News

Illustration: Chaitanya Dinesh Surpur Thats a corolla? Where is a flowers calyx? If these terms take you back to diagrams in textbooks, you must be older than 25.

Chances are your biology teacher was syllabus-focussed and maybe even boring. Chances also are that your teacher was not dressed la Shah Rukh Khan in the 2000 film Mohabbatein as part of an elaborate video setup, to teach you what a corolla is in a 60-second video on TikTok.

In another video, Firdausi is inside what looks like the sea, with computer-generated images of fish swimming around. How do you tell if a fish has bones or cartilages by just looking at it? Firdausi explains with the help of animation, in just under a minute.

Firdausi is an associate professor at edtech company Toppr, which has a learning app for students from classes 5 to 12 and multiple entrance exams. In October, social media platform TikTokowned by Chinese internet giant ByteDance and famous for its short videosrolled out #EduTok, an e-learning programme for India, for which it has engaged content creators such as Toppr.

Is the #EduTok bet paying off? It could, and could signal the future of education too.

The exam includes logical reasoning, quantitative analysis and English vocabulary. The study material on Gradeup and TikTok is tailored for that, she explains. While Gradeup offers quizzes, Tomar also found tips and tricks to solve math problems quickly on TikTok.

Being on TikTok does not require heavy concentration and the interactive format is such that we can learn at any time, even when we are travelling. Every day, I get to learn at least seven to eight new words of English vocabulary, she says.

Tomar believes that given the information overload and various distractions, edtech apps streamline education, while platforms like TikTok add an element of fun. If we are moving toward 5G in telecom, why stick to just books in education? We have to speed up there too.

For an entire generation of students, studying is becoming less about textbooks and more about smartphones. Indias online education market is set to grow to $1.96 billion with around 9.6 million users in 2021, up from $247 million and about 1.6 million users in 2016, according to Online Education in India: 2021, a report by KPMG in India, and Google.

To keep students hooked on to their respective platforms, education providers are experimenting with test prep and lessons on social media channelsnot just TikTok, but also platforms like Telegram and Bigo Livethat host snappy videos, bite-sized formats, real-time online group studies, interactive quizzes and live streaming. This is a step further from long videos or image-based learning that were popular on YouTube and Facebook respectively. This is edtech 2.0, if you will.

Education vs Engagement For a generation hooked to content, how do you strike a balance between education and entertainment?

Its evolving and were figuring it out, says Shobhit Bhatnagar, CEO and co-founder of Gradeup. Not only must faculty members be subject matter experts, but they also have to have great delivery, screen-presence and creativity.

Teachers go through the equivalent of auditions at the time of hiring, giving demonstrative recorded lectures. Were working on building technology to help us here too, adds Bhatnagar. For example, the system should be able to quantify certain paramenters: The number of times eye-contact is made; how many times teachers ask interactive questions like Samajh aaya? [Do you understand?]

The difference here is that in a regular classroom, students have to stick around. Here, if they lose interest, they will open another tab, and head to another distraction, he adds.

To make sure they maintain the balance between education and engagement, edtech startups are investing in full-stack studios, equipment and media trainers, who have experience with TV shows and news.

Arshad Shahid, creative head of Toppr says a lot of their success is credited to this media team. It took them over two to three months of trial and error to understand what really clicks with students: Videos that explain concepts with informal language, interactive graphics, and references to films and pop culture. Earlier, we would spend 2 hours for one video. Now, after the script is ready, we can shoot within 15 minutes, says Shahid.

It is competitive and creates a lot of pressure on teachers. The media trainers see how teachers are performing on camera and train them on how to act, how to engage and create interaction, says Bhatnagar, whose Gradeup has four TikTok channels and eight Telegram groups, each with 10,000 to 15,000 followers.

Bhopal-based Pushpendra Dhakad, who runs a coaching class called Fly High Academy, doesnt have as sophisticated a set-up, but has 2 million likes on TikTok, and more than 350,000 followers. He is an #EduTok creator, but his target audience is not just students. I signed up on TikTok to take educational content farther. Homemakers, security guards, vegetable vendors, shopkeepers watch my videos, and I want to teach them basic, conversational English, he says. I teach common English phrases, pronunciation, the difference between American and British English, and so on.

Similarly, Singapore-based live-streaming network Bigo Live, made a $100 million investment in India last year, and is focussed on Indias rural communities. Last year, we hired over 200 qualified teachers who were able to teach English and soft skills such as Excel, PowerPoint and elementary Photoshop, says Mike Ong, vice president (government relations), Bigo Technology. We have significantly grown our strength in India; from 200-odd employees last year to 1,000 now.

Baby Steps The first wave of e-learning took off with YouTube and Facebook, where viewers watched long-form videos. In this next generation, the focus is on real-time, short-form and condensed learning. However, experts say that while such tools can aid in driving engagement and delivering single concepts, for in-depth learning, long formats works better.

This where Telegram has gained ground. It works and looks much like WhatsApp. However, a Telegram group can have up to 2 lakh members, whereas WhatsApp groups can have 256 members at most. Telegram also has quick file-sharing features so that files dont need to be downloaded and can be accessed from the cloud. Edtech companies are seeing reams of textbooks and answer sheets digitisedand often piratedon Telegram groups.

The way we look at it, you cant stop the piracy, says Abhishek Patil, co-founder, Oliveboard, an online platform for entrance exam preparation, with 6 million registered users. So instead, were working on building our own presence on Telegram, creating videos and e-books. We see that a large section of students is using Telegram specifically to study, versus TikTok, which is a mix of entertainment and education.

Hadia Khan, 19, a biotech student at Allahabad University, is one such student. On Telegram, each group has more than 15,000 members, so there are a few hundred active users at any given point, she says. If I get stuck at a particular question, I can post my query and someone will help me out in real-time. Its like group study, but online.

Khan signed up for an annual Oliveboard subscription since it is cheaper than coaching classes. I realised that on Facebook groups, there are many trolls and irrelevant comments, she says. But on Telegram, theres almost no spamming, and the administators are quick to delete anything unfit.

Stepapp gamifies the learning process for math and science from classes 6 to 12 in the CBSE and ICSE curricula; students can earn virtual currency and real scholarships too. Parents can get real-time reports of their progress. Ive been working on it for 10 years, Tyagi says.

With children, weve long believed that they can either play or study. Here, they can do both. Youll have concise concepts at your fingertips and a revision bank, all while feeling like you are playing a game.

Stepapp, like Oliveboard, uses TikTok and Instagram as marketing tools to draw students to their apps. For Toppr and Gradeup, too, the function of the social media channels is to build branding and visibility, to go where the students are and incentivise them to come to the main platform.

Relative to Facebook and YouTube, these platforms are still in the early stages in terms of getting actual outcomes, says Bhatnagar. We still havent learnt enough about them to make big investments, so just about 3 to 5 percent of our marketing budget is allocated here. Most of this is to understand what kind of users we can acquire and what return on investments we are getting. As our learning and the quality of data we can get from these platforms as advertisers rise, so will our focus here.

Facebook and YouTube continue to lead the charge in edtech, but newer players are seeking alternative avenues. On YouTube, students can get MIT lectures free of cost too why would they come to me? asks Tyagi. Thats why we didnt want to get into that space, and instead, build our own.

Fast forward Will we see a world in which students no longer need to go to physical classrooms?

There are many things that technology cannot do. A students writing skills cant be improved remotely, and technology cannot shape his or her personality, says Tyagi. However, theres a lot that can be done with technology, and we cant ignore that.

When the internet was first adopted, there was a hue and cry about it replacing books, says Narayan Ramaswamy, partner and head-education, KPMG in India. Even at work, many things are discussed on Telegram, WhatsApp or Facebook groups. You cant rely on the internet for entirely factual information, but you cannot do without it. Similarly, social media is a part of the students life, and if we want to proactively engage with them, we need to be present on social media too.

If the platforms lead to productive learning, theres no harm, Ramaswamy adds. Individual students can find the most effective processes for their learning. We should not control these things. However, colleges or education providers should not rely on them too much, else their offering will become diluted.

(This story appears in the 28 February, 2020 issue of Forbes India. You can buy our tablet version from Magzter.com. To visit our Archives, click here.)

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When TikTok Becomes Your Teacher - Forbes India

Roundup It's a long weekend in the US, though sadly not in Blighty. So, for those of you starting your week, here's some bite-sized machine-learning news, beyond what we've recently covered, if that's your jam.

Check your training data: A popular dataset for training self-driving vehicles, including an open-source autonomous car system, failed to correctly label hundreds of pedestrians and thousands of vehicles.

Brad Dwyer, founder of Roboflow, a startup focused on building data science tools, discovered the errors when he started digging into the dataset compiled by Udacity, an online education platform.

I first noticed images that were missing annotations, Dwyer told The Register. That led me to dig in deeper and check some of the other images. I found so many errors I ended up going through all 15,000 images because I didnt want to re-share a dataset that had such obvious errors.

After flicking through each image, he found that 33 per cent of them contained mistakes. Thousands of vehicles, hundreds of pedestrians, and dozens of cyclists were not labelled. Some of the bounding boxes around objects were duplicated or needlessly oversized too.

Training an autonomous car on such an incomplete dataset could potentially be dangerous. The collection was pulled together to make it easier for engineers to collaborate and build a self-driving car. Thankfully, a project to develop such a system using this information seems to have died down since it launched more than three years ago.

Udacity created this dataset years ago as a tool purely for educational purposes, back when self-driving car datasets were very hard to come by, and those learning the skills needed to develop a career in this field lacked adequate training resources, a Udacity spokesperson told El Reg.

At the time it was helpful to the researchers and engineers who were transitioning into the autonomous vehicle community. In the intervening years, companies like Waymo, nuTonomy, and Voyage have published newer, better datasets intended for real-world scenarios. As a result, our project hasn't been active for three years.

We make no representations that the dataset is fully labeled or complete. Any attempts to show this educational data set as an actual dataset are both misleading and unhelpful. Udacity's self-driving car currently operates for educational purposes only on a closed test track. Our car has not operated on public streets for several years, so our car poses no risk to the public.

Roboflow has since corrected the errors on the dataset, and issued an improved version.

Standing up to patent trolls works: Mycroft AI, a startup building an open-source voice-controlled assistant for Linux-based devices, was sued for allegedly infringing a couple of patents, as we reported earlier this month.

Mycrofts CEO Joshua Montgomery spoke to The Register about his strong suspicions that he was being targeted by a so-called patent troll. His biz was told by a lawyer representing the patents' owner to cough up a license fee, and when Montgomery ignored the request, a patent-infringement lawsuit was filed against his company.

The mysterious patent owner, Voice Tech Corp, turned out to a brand new company in Texas, USA, and it's address was someones bungalow, according to court filings. All of that fueled the growing speculation that, yes, Voice Tech Corp, was probably a patent troll.

Now, after facing sufficient resistance from Mycroft, Voice Tech Corp has dropped its case. Montgomery threatened to fight the lawsuit all the way to get Voice Tech Corps patents invalidated so that no other startup would have to face the same problem.

More Clearview drama: The controversial facial-recognition outfit that admitted to harvesting more than three billion publicly shared photos from social media sites is back in the news again.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) revealed it is trying to get Clearview to remove the claim from its marketing that its facial recognition code was verified using a methodology used by the ACLU. The rights warriors said they had no involvement in the product and do not endorse it. In fact, the union is pretty much against everything Clearview is doing.

Clearview boasts that its technology is 99 per cent accurate following numerous tests. Buzzfeed News, however, reckons it is nowhere near that good. The upstart previously said its algorithms helped police in New York City catch a terrorist planning to plant fake bombs on the subway. NYPD denied using Clearviews software.

Google, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook have sent Clearview cease-and-desist letters demanding the startup stop scraping images of their platforms, and to delete those in its database. In a bizarre interview, Clearviews CEO fought back and said he believed that since all the photos were public, his stateside company, therefore, had a First Amendment right to public information." Er, yeah right.

Public funding for AI, 5G: President Donald Trump has vowed to spend more of US taxpayers' money on the research and development of emergent technologies, such as AI, quantum computing, and 5G, than traditional sciences.

The Budget prioritizes accelerating AI solutions, according to a proposal, subject to congressional approval, published this week. Along with quantum information sciences, advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, and 5G research and development (R&D), these technologies will be at the forefront of shaping future economies.

The Budget proposes large increases for key industries, including doubling AI and quantum information sciences R&D by 2022 as part of an all-of-Government approach to ensure the United States leads the world in these areas well into the future.

Trump pledged to spend $142.2bn in R&D for the next fiscal year, nine per cent less than this year. While AI and quantum computing are favored, there's less federal funding for general research and development for the other sciences.

The Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and others, will see cuts. The DOEs Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) will be particularly hard hit: not only does the proposed budget effectively eliminate the agency, it must pay back $311m to the treasury.

You can read more about the proposed budget for the fiscal year of 2021, here.

CEO of AI startup steps down over allegations: The CEO of Clinc, a small artificial-intelligence outfit spun out of the University of Michigan, has resigned following claims he sexually harassed employees and customers.

Jason Mars, an assistant professor of computer science at the university, was accused of physically accosting clients, making lewd comments about female employees and interns, and hiring a prostitute during a work trip.

In an email to employees at Clinc, first reported by The Verge, Mars said the allegations against him were rife with embellishments and fabrications. He did, however, admit to drinking too much and partying with staff in a way thats not becoming of a CEO.

Sponsored: Detecting cyber attacks as a small to medium business

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Please check your data: A self-driving car dataset failed to label hundreds of pedestrians, thousands of vehicles - The Register

February 17, 2020 | 5:32 AM

Spotlight PAis an independent, nonpartisan newsroom powered by The Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and PennLive/The Patriot-News.Sign up for our free weekly newsletter.

(Harrisburg) With $4 million in state funding, Pennsylvania is buying ads and preparing to award grants to nonprofit organizations, grassroots groups, and colleges to ensure every resident is counted in the 2020 census.

We are making sure that we are counting everyone from rural, suburban, and urban areas in Pennsylvania, said Norman Bristol Coln, executive director of Gov. Tom WolfsComplete Count Commission. We also recognize that our state is more diverse than ever before, so we have to concentrate our efforts on the hard-to-count populations.

The census takes place every 10 years to count each person in the country. The information is used to determine each states share of billions of dollars in federal funding and number of U.S. House seats.

For the first time, the U.S. Census Bureau is asking most people to fill out the survey online. Every household will be invited to participate by April 1.

The commission a coalition of advocacy, education, housing, and religious organizationscreatedby Wolf in September 2018 originally requested $13 million from the legislature for outreach efforts, a dollar for each Pennsylvanian. But lawmakers were hesitant to make an investment of that size, Bristol Coln said.

Finally, they recognized the important work that needs to be done, especially when it comes to the $27 billion in federal funds we get through the census [each year], he said. They came back to the table and they provided us the opportunity to have the $4 million to do the complete count.

Jan Murphy / PennLive

Pennsylvanias second lady Gisele Fetterman (at podium) announces at a Capitol news conference her upcoming statewide tour to try to get hard-to-reach populations to participate in the 2020 U.S. census.

The funding was included in avoting reform packagepassed in 2019. Neighboring New York isputting$20 million in state funding toward the census, while New Jersey and Maryland have appropriated $9 million and $5 million, respectively.

The state has a $2.5 million contract with Red House Communications to produce and place census ads through radio and television stations, and in traditional print media, according to a Department of Community & Economic Development spokesperson. The state has also targeted Latinx and black news outlets, Bristol Coln said, as well as social media platforms.

The department is also reviewing applications for the $1 millionCensus 2020 Outreach Grant Program, which will award nonprofits, faith-based organizations, and higher education institutions with up to $50,000 in funding. The money will be used to target hard-to-reach groups through outreach efforts, including buying local media ads or sponsoring census-related events.

Theapplication processcloses Feb. 14. The other $500,000 in state census money is allotted for miscellaneous expenses, including printed materials for communications purposes, a department spokesperson said.

Hard-to-reach populations a blanket term for groups like minorities, immigrants, low-income earners, renters, farmworkers, and rural residents are a priority for the states Complete Count Commission. Some immigrants can behard to reachbecause of language barriers, mistrust in the U.S. government, and fear of repercussions, according to commission member and immigrants-rights group CASA.

Pennsylvania is home to a growing Latinx population, including Puerto Ricans who sought refuge in the state after Hurricane Maria in 2017. More than 10,000 people arrived in Pennsylvania after the devastating storm, according to CASA.

Hansi Lo Wang / NPR

Ed Reed (right), Fair Counts program manager, and Djemanesh Aneteneh, an operations and events administrator, look over a map showing the Wi-Fi hotspots the group has installed around Georgia.

President Donald Trump had sought to add a question about citizenship to the census, leading to concerns about an undercount of immigrant households, butultimately did not prevail. Second Lady Gisele Fetterman, who wasbornin Brazil, istouringselect counties to promote participation.

Although the survey is being offered online,Complete Count Committees locally focused groups formed by municipalities or community leaders are still depending on census workers to canvas areas. But finding workers to count these critical populations has been difficult.

Februarydatafrom the Census Bureau shows successful recruitment efforts in Pennsylvanias largest counties, including Allegheny and Philadelphia. But several rural counties in the state are under 40 percent of the hiring goal.

It has been a great challenge for the Census Bureau to fill all the temporary jobs for census 2020 due to a low unemployment rate and the digital component to the application process, Bristol Coln said.

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Pennsylvania is spending $4 million to ensure hard-to-reach groups are counted in the 2020 census - PA Post

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that the primary culprits of a fraudulent international online business education program agreed to settle the lawsuit filed against them.

According to the FTC, the defendants behind My Online Business Education (MOBE), a Malaysian company, agreed to pay more than $17 million as part of the settlement.

Under the proposed stipulated order, MOBE founder Matthew Lloyd McPhee will surrender more than $16 million from his personal and company accounts to the Commission. He will also surrender to MOBEs court-appointed receiver his interests in foreign real estate including Costa Rica Resort Property, Fiji Resort Property, and Kuala Lumpur Properties.

The order also permanently prohibits McPhee from selling business coaching programs and investment opportunities. The defendant is an Australian citizen residing in Malaysia.

Additionally, the estate of deceased defendant Russell Whitney surrendered to the FTC over $1.3 million held in his various accounts.

In December 2018, another defendant in the case, Susan Zanghi agreed to turn over to the Commission more than $33,400 in frozen assets under her name. She also agreed to surrender all control over funds held in the name of MOBE corporate entities. The settlement permanently prohibited her from selling or marketing business coaching or investment opportunities.

In June 2018, the FTC sued the three individual defendants and the nine businesses responsible for operating MOBE. The Commission accused the defendants of swindling more than $125 million from thousands of consumers including U.S. service members, veterans, and older adults. They allegedly targeted U.S. consumers through direct mailers, live events, online ads, and social media.

The defendants allegedly made false claims that their business education program will allow consumers to start online businesses and make a substantial profit. They also claimed that their 21-step system is proven in generating a significant amount of money from internet marketing.

In a statement, FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection Director Andrew Smith said, MOBE falsely promised consumers that it could teach them how to start a successful online business and earn six-figure incomes working from home, and consumers lost millions of dollars as a result. With this action, weve put an end to the MOBE scheme, but consumers should be on guard for any work-at-home pitch promising substantial income.

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Perpetrators of fraudulent online business education program to pay $17 million to settle FTC charges - USA Herald

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Real Estate Investing Q&A with David Sherman - ABA Banking Journal

Assembly Democrats are calling for more funding to go toward colleges and universities, more money for student living expenses and to keep tuition costs level as part of the houses 2020-21 proposed state budget.

Both the state senate and assembly propose their own state budgets, called one-house budgets every year around mid-March that influence final budget negotiations.

The Assembly Majority has long recognized that higher education is critical to establishing a pathway to the middle class for New Yorkers, said Heastie in a statement released over the weekend. Our proposed budget will reflect our unwavering commitment to higher education by breaking down even more barriers and putting our students on the path to success.

The proposed budget will call for a $50 million investment in the city and state university systems to help close something called the TAP gap, or the difference the state spends in tuition-assistant grants for low-income students and tuition. In 2011, SUNY and CUNY were given the right to increase tuition by $300 over five years under NYSUNY 2020. After the legislation was enacted, both institutions took on the difference between tuition and the states Tuition Assistance Program awards.

According to the statement, the proposed budget will also include $20 million to create the Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship Fund. The scholarship would help students receive New York State Tuition Assistance pay for room, board, transportation, textbooks and university and college fees.

While proposing more funding, statement added that the assembly will also continue to push back against the proposed tuition hikes at SUNY and CUNY.

Over the last five years, we have fought to keep higher education within reach for our students, and to provide greater access to critical campus resources such as libraries and research facilities, said Assembly Higher Education Committee Chair Deborah Glick.

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Assembly to call for more investment in higher education in proposed New York state budget - amNY

MONROE, La. (KNOE) - When it comes to investing for some, it can be a hard financial strategy to achieve. Certified Financial Counselor Kelly Brantley joined us to share some investing tips to help build wealth.

A saying Kelly always uses when it comes to financial planning is to remember slow and steady wins the race. The same applies to investing.

Before investing, Kelly recommends having all debt paid off except your home.

Have 15% of the investment saved into retirement into company match 401K and then put the rest in a RALT IRA.

The RAFT IRA grows tax-free and redraws tax-free during retirement.

Kelly says the first step to take when investing is to learn how to live on less than what you make.

The first investment to look into is having an emergency fund up to $1,000 in case of crisis.

There are ways of diversifying investing by saving 25% of your money in different funds. Those funds include growth, aggressive growth, income and international funds.

For more tips on investing, call Kelly Brantley at 318-497-1059.

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Investing tips with Kelly Brantley - Knoe.com

Nebraska Plastics, Inc, a vinyl fence manufacturer, will create 22 new jobs in Chowan County, Governor Roy Cooper announced today. The company will invest more than $1 million into a manufacturing facility in Edenton.

Manufacturing companies like Nebraska Plastics choose to grow in North Carolina because of our strong economy, great quality of life, and especially for our talented workforce, said Governor Cooper.

Nebraska Plastics, Inc. started in 1945 producing plastic irrigation products for agriculture. The company first invented vinyl fencing in 1978 under the brand name Country Estate Fence. Headquartered in Cozad, Nebraska, the company has remained a family-owned business for 75 years and supplies products to customers in all 50 states and overseas. Along with vinyl fence and railing, Nebraska Plastics continues to produce a line of above ground and below ground PVC irrigation pipe for agriculture.

The opportunity to produce Country Estate Vinyl Products in Edenton, North Carolina gives us a unique advantage to supply our growing demand on the East Coast by producing products closer to our customers, said Paul German, President and CEO of Nebraska Plastics, Inc. We are excited to be a part of the community of Edenton. Our customers will enjoy the same quality products they are used to. Having two locations now allows us to improve customer service while reducing freight costs.

North Carolina has the fifth largest manufacturing economy in the United States, said North Carolina Commerce Secretary Anthony M. Copeland. With more than 170 million customers within a days drive and the largest manufacturing workforce in the Southeast, North Carolina is a great state for manufacturers to expand their operations.

The North Carolina Department of Commerce led the states support for the companys decision.

Although wages will vary depending on the position, the average for all new positions could reach up to $36,591. The current average annual wage in Chowan County is $34,112.

A performance-based grant of $60,000 from the One North Carolina Fund will help facilitate Nebraska Plastics expansion to North Carolina. The One N.C. Fund provides financial assistance to local governments to help attract economic investment and to create jobs. Companies receive no money upfront and must meet job creation and capital investment targets to qualify for payment. All One N.C. grants require a matching grant from local governments and any award is contingent upon that condition being met.

This is great news for Chowan County, said N.C. Senator Bob Steinburg. The business community and residents will be greatly enriched by these new jobs. We are ready to support the companys expansion in any way we can.

Nebraska Plastics is making a great investment in Edenton and North Carolina, said N.C. Representative Edward C. Goodwin. We are confident that our business climate and East Coast location will help the company thrive."

In addition to N.C. Commerce and the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, other key partners in the project include the North Carolina General Assembly, North Carolina Community College System, Town of Edenton, Chowan County, and Edenton Chowan Partnership.

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Fence Maker to Invest $1 Million in Edenton - NC Dept of Commerce

The government plans to open up almost all business sectors to foreign investment and issue a positive investment list in an omnibus bill on job creation. According to a draft of the bill obtained by The Jakarta Post, all business sectors will be open to direct investment, except those declared prohibited from such activity or those that can only be handled by the government. The prohibited areas are narcotics, gambling, chemical weapon industry, ozone-depleting substances, coral extraction and fishing activities for endangered species based on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Meanwhile, the sectors that can only be handled by the government are those related to public services or defense and security, such as primary weapons defense system, state-owned museums, as well as flight and sailing navigation systems. Furth...

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Government to liberalize investment in omnibus bill on job creation - Jakarta Post