DP: Protesters disrupt Wharton conference

Following my first "Beat the Press" post Wednesday about the Daily Pennsylvanian's coverage of the Wharton Private Equity Conference, the DP published this news brief:

Last Friday, members of the Service Employees International Union and their supporters gathered to protest a speech by David Rubenstein, co-founder of the private equity firm, the Carlyle Group.

Rubenstein was a keynote speaker at Wharton's 14th annual private equity and venture capital conference. The approximately 50 protestors disrupted his speech for approximately half an hour, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

According to Dennis Short, research coordinator for SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania, the group turned out to oppose the short staffing and lack of supplies in Manor Care, a nursing care provider that the Carlyle Group acquired three weeks ago.

Short added that the union began protesting conditions with Manor Care's former owner and they insisted that Carlyle Group address the ongoing problems as part of the acquisition. He alleges that Manor Care has still not done so.

I am really happy that the DP was able to set the record straight on what happened at the conference and that they were able to include information from the SEIU. The news brief also quotes Jordan Elpern-Waxman, the Communication Director of the Conference:

Jordan Elpern-Waxman insists that the company cannot be held responsible for these conditions such a short time after the business deal.

Really? Who then should be held accountable? And do we really think that Carlyle is going to improve conditions by increasing staffing and supplies? Somehow I don't remember that to be their modus operandi. Will Carlyle let their employees unionize if they want to?

From the SEIU press release,

According to the New York Times investigation, “At 60 percent of homes bought by large private equity groups from 2000 to 2006, managers have cut the number of clinical registered nurses, sometimes far below levels required by law. During that period, staffing at many of the nation’s other homes has fallen much less or grown.” In the last year alone, 6,000 layoffs have been announced as a result of buyouts involving the Carlyle Group.

Ya, that sounds more like it. I guess we will have to wait and see if Rubenstein's commitment to avoid layoffs will hold true.

~BT

Why students should care about the UA

From a free music service to advocacy for sustainable practices on campus, the Undergraduate Assembly is working for students

By: Brett Thalmann & Jason Karsh

Throughout the year, we constantly get asked the questions: "What does the UA do?" or "Why should I care about student government?"

These questions, while seemingly simple, cannot be answered in this limited guest column. We hope, however, to explain some of our accomplishments from this past year and give you a preview of what to expect in the coming year.

In previous years, the UA has become more accountable and has increasingly focused on projects that are tangible to students.

We have tackled sustainability - an environmentally conscious campaign - and have successfully brought the issue to the forefront of the administrative agenda. President Amy Gutmann has even signed the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment, committing Penn "to achieve climate neutrality by reducing campus greenhouse gas emissions."

Our calls for improved Student Health facilities that began with the formation of the Student Health Advisory Board, have resulted in the recent announcement of a new facility for Student Health Services.

While advocating for improvements to College Houses, we collaborated with the University to ensure that the high-rises will be fully renovated and further identified the dire need for renovations in the low-rises. In the midst of the huge undertaking of high-rise renovations, we've successfully convinced the university to make specific and immediate improvements to the low rises.

We have not yet even mentioned our most widely known projects throughout the year!

After two years of planning, the UA brought Ruckus Music Service free to students.

For the second year in a row we've run the convenient and cheap UA bus service to the airport before every major holiday break.

Most recently, we spearheaded the program that brought students free copies of The New York Times, USA Today and The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Additionally, this year saw an amazing collaboration among student leaders through UA Steering, the committee of the UA that brings the leaders of every umbrella and representative organization together to discuss major student issues.

Notably, the amazing Penn traditions of Spring Fling and Hey Day were preserved by the collaboration and support of the members of UA Steering. For example, Fling Safe, run by SPEC, found immense support and feedback that proved crucial to its success. When Hey Day was called into jeopardy, it was UA Steering that worked with the Class Boards to promote and publicize efforts to curb dangerous, emerging trends.

For the coming year, the UA plans to build off the great momentum achieved this year. We plan to increase the accessibility of the UA by reaching out directly to students and student groups. We plan to be more visible through YouTube addresses that will accompany all-school e-mails. We also want to ensure that students have the ability to be heard by their student representatives, so there will be a 10 minute open forum at every UA meeting next year.

We plan on empowering students through providing a strong student voice to administrators and empowering UA members to pursue projects that are important to themselves and the student body at large.

Finally, we plan to increase efficiency of the UA through a more transparent process and productive meetings.

So, when posing the question: "Why should I care about student government?" the answer is really that student government cares about you. Whether you pay us heed or not, we work on tangible projects that improve student life.

The real question is, what do you want your student government to do for you?

Originally published in the Daily Pennsylvanian on 5/11/07.

~BT

Penn talent on display online

Although there is a decent amount of Penn-made video content online at the moment, I wish there were more and better stuff. Student groups should make it a habit of posting video content on YouTube to publicize their amazing talents. Also, there are so many great speakers and other events on campus that could be filmed and put online. For starters, why doesn't UTV-13, Penn's student-run television channel, not put their content online?

Getting the content is only the first step. There should also be some centralized site devoted to gathering and organizing content from Penn. This is something the UA has been working on and we focused on Penn adopting and implementing ITunesU. Weirdly, the DP editorial board thinks that Penn can't handle ITunesU and that it is a distraction for the UA. I completely disagree and think this will turn out to be a great resource for students. And I'm not the only one! Many people responded vocally to the editorial as did James Russell on the DP's blog, The Spin saying that ITunesU is common sense.

Hopefully, Penn's ItunesU will go live sometime this summer and then we can start gathering content. Until then, I put together a list of Penn videos I found and liked enough to bookmark. Here are highlights of Penn online content:

Strictly Funk: "Let's Get Retarded"


Hype's Intro Video


Dhamaka's full length iPod intro video


~BT