Bike ? Jumpstart puts kids in the game - Halton SportsXpress

By Tracy Poulin

I love riding my bike and this year I learned how much I can help my community by doing just that. In September I took part in the Canadian Tire Jumpstart Pedal for Kids Tour.? Jumpstart is a 500 kilometre bike ride over five days from Kingston to Niagara Falls with fundraising helping financially disadvantaged kids to participate in organized sport and recreation. When I registered for the tour, I was a little bit intimidated by the distance considering I usually head out to Kelso for a couple of hours on my mountain bike or hit the scenic roads of Milton for a 60 kilometre ride once a week. But with a bit of training, I knew I could do it. I spent some time with my husband Rich, an avid cyclist himself, and we built a training plan. With two small children, I unfortunately couldn?t have him out with me on my training rides. Each week I would do two evening rides on my own and then we would do the longer training rides on the weekend together (thanks to our amazing babysitters). It is unbelievable how many cyclists are out on the road everyday in our area. You are never really riding on your own, as there is always someone going by and giving you the cyclist wave.

On Monday, September 17, 30 of us started the ride in Kingston to do an average of 100 kilometres a day for five days. All along the route, we would stop to donate sports equipment and funds to various boy?s and girl?s clubs, YMCA locations and other organizations that Jumpstart supports. Seeing the kids benefitting from the donations was heart warming to say the least.

The ride had its challenging moments like a wet and rainy Tuesday and an extra long 140 kilometre ride from Cobourg to Toronto on the Wednesday, but all in all, it was an amazing ride where I got to meet some amazing people. On Friday the 21st, we had an additional 70 cyclists join us for the last 100 kilometres of the ride from Burlington to Niagara Falls, including my husband Rich and close friend Tania. It was a sea of black, white and red as we rode along the waterfront trail with our Jumpstart jerseys on. I felt so proud to be a part of this event helping kids grow up to be healthy and confident adults. Through the Pedal for Kids Tour alone, we raised over $260,000 towards Jumpstart. I have worked for Canadian Tire Financial Services in Oakville for over nine years and I am so proud to share that on Friday, October 2, Canadian Tire Jumpstart announced a significant historic milestone. Since its inception, Jumpstart has helped more than 500,000 kids across Canada participate in organized sports and recreation. Within the Milton community alone, Jumpstart has helped 224 children get into the game.

A recent study confirmed that two-thirds of Canadians know at least one person who can?t afford to enrol his or her child in recreational activities, and that 750,000 children aged 4 to 18 cannot participate in sports and recreation across Canada because of financial limitations. Through donations and fundraising efforts, Jumpstart has helped half a million children in need, participate in 71 different activities. Offering programs from swimming and hockey to football and dance, Jumpstart reaches kids who need it the most.

I have been donating to Jumpstart each and every year since I started working for Canadian Tire, but this year is the first time I have been involved in an event of this magnitude to support the charity. I love that while doing something I enjoy so much, I am also helping children enrich their lives in ways that wouldn?t be possible without Jumpstart. And what makes it hit home, is that all of the funds I raise go directly to support the community that I live in, in Milton.

For more information on Jumpstart, please visit jumpstart.canadiantire.ca.

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Source: http://haltonsportsxpress.ca/2012/11/09/jumpstart-puts-kids-in-the-game/

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Claire Langhams EDM310 Blog: Special Blog Assignment ...

A World Where Grades Will Be Left Behind In celebration of its 30th anniversary, USA TODAY interviewed some of the USA's greatest visionaries to talk about the world of tomorrow. Mary Beth Marklein published the article "A World Where Grades Will Be Left Behind" to discuss just what the title implies: what would the world be like if there were no grades? In the article, USA TODAY interviewed Sebastian Thrun, a Google Vice President and Stanford research professor best known for his role in building Google's driverless car. Thrun's idea of an educational reform is described in his version of learning, which he says can be made free and available to anyone who wants it. Thrun is the owner of Udacity, which is an education company based in California that provides a higher education for free. Udacity's goal is to offer a university-level education of high quality and low cost. Using the economics of the Internet, they claim to have connected some of the greatest teachers to hundreds of thousands of students all over the world. In Thrun's version of education, he explains a few key concepts: no one will be late for class, failure is not an option, and lessons are made to look like games, such as the popular physics-based puzzle game "Angry Birds." The whole vision of Udacity came to Thrun after he had the opportunity to teach a free online artificial-intelligence course that drew more than 160,000 students. This experience was so profound to him that he announced he no longer could teach in a traditional Stanford classroom. Thus, Udacity was born, and Thrun began his mission to revolutionize education. He made reference to the concept of "flipping the classroom," which occurs when students watch a video at home and come to class ready with questions to be answered by the teacher. Thrun explains how both online learning and flipping the classroom are made possible through technology, and because of these two concepts, classes will involve a sequence of increasingly more challenging exercises and quizzes aimed at helping students master a particular concept or skill. Thrun calls grades "the failure of the education system," so therefore, he intends to eliminate them completely. Instead, students will take as much or as little time as they need to demonstrate mastery of a particular skill or concept. This type of online education will be free, but related services may involve a fee. All in all, Thrun hopes to democratize education through technology. As I was reading this article, the message Mr. Thrun described seemed really cool and much more innovative than the education we see in many classrooms today. As I thought about it and looked at it more closely though, this type of educational reform raises a sense of skepticism. Yes, a free education where you get to play games on the Internet and learn at your own pace sounds great, but in reality, is this concept of education truly possible to the magnitude in which Mr. Thrun described? I have my doubts. The first item on his list that seems out of reach is the free part. If the top, most sought-out professors from all around the world are being called upon to teach these online classes, how does the Udacity team plan on paying them a salary? As a future teacher, I'm all about teaching my students because I truly want them to learn and grow, but in reality, I will be seeking a paycheck as well. I'm sure many of the professors Udacity has confronted feel the same way. I understand the students would be charged fees every once and a while, but simple fees would not be enough to pay for the numerous things this operation would call for: the high-tech computers and software that would be needed, the team working on these computers and programs, and as I mentioned earlier, the professors teaching the courses. "Free" sounds great (especially to myself, a poor college kid), but when it comes down to crunching the numbers, money speaks rather loudly. The next item on the list that raises concerns for me is the fact that "a single class might enroll tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of students." I guess this sounds so bizarre to me because I personally like one-on-one contact and time with my teacher. If there are this many people in a single class, how is an instructor suppose to keep up with everything the students are doing? I understand Mr. Thrun's goal is to create an education that will respond to each individual student, but with that many students, I have my doubts. The third item I'd like to talk about is the "no more grades" idea. As a college student myself, this sounds wonderful. As long as I'm understanding the material and learning at my own pace, what do grades matter anyway? Well, as much as I hate to admit it, I think grades, or rather some kind of assessment, is needed. I'm all for students being able to take the time necessary to master concepts and skills, but without some form of assessment, I think students lose some of the responsibility needed to become successful. I don't necessarily think the "A, B, C, D, F" system is the only or best solution for assessment out there, but I do believe teachers should provide students with feedback on how they are progressing in a given class. Normally, that feedback comes through assessment.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading Mary Beth Marklein's article in USA TODAY because it brought up some really neat ideas for the future of education. Though I don't totally agree with everything Mr. Sebastian Thrun is advocating with the online learning society created by Udacity, I still think he offered up interesting and innovative ideas. I just believe a few things need to be tweaked to make them more realistic and doable. One thing Mr. Thrun and I most certainly agree on is how important technology is for the future and progression of education and for the way we teach our students.

Source: http://langhamclaireedm310.blogspot.com/2012/11/special-blog-assignment.html

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The Decades That Invented the Future, Part 4: 1931-1940

Since 2007, Wired.com’s This Day In Tech blog has reflected on important and entertaining events in the history of science and innovation, pursuing them chronologically for each day of the year. Hundreds of these essays have now been collected into ...

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GearFactor/~3/ELFKHr9nJ1s/

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UK broadcasters warned over "witch hunt"

LONDON (AP) ? Since accusations surfaced last month that a renowned British TV host sexually abused young victims for decades without being exposed, scores of adults have come forward to claim that their own allegations of sex assault in the past were ignored.

Worries that Britain's institutions ? and its media ? have for years been too conservative in handling claims of child abuse have jolted the nation's public debate, prompting an abrupt turn that culminated in the prime minister being handed, on live television, a list of high-profile figures named in Internet rumors as possible sex offenders and the very public assertion by a politician that he is not a child molester.

With the country reeling over how to respond to a torrent of new abuse claims, Prime Minister David Cameron Friday warned the media and the public of the danger of shredding the reputations of innocent figures.

"Effectively, you are casting lots of aspersions about lots of people without any evidence," Cameron said. "You have to be careful you don't start some sort of witch hunt against some people who might be entirely innocent."

The BBC, already criticized over its reluctance to broadcast allegations of child abuse carried out by the late Jimmy Savile, one of its prominent stars, now faces questions about its handling of abuse accusations leveled against a senior political figure.

Last week, BBC's "Newsnight" aired a report on allegations related to sex abuse in Wales in the 1970s and 1980s. The program interviewed abuse victim Steve Messham, who claimed that previous reports into the Wales scandal had failed to examine abuse by someone he described as a senior Conservative Party figure at the time.

On Friday, Alistair McAlpine, a Conservative Party member of the House of Lords, identified himself as the target of online rumors ? saying he was likely the political figure referred to, but not named, in the "Newsnight" report. McAlpine, who was Conservative Party treasurer in the era of Margaret Thatcher, insisted he had never been involved in the abuse of children and suggested that he had been the victim of mistaken identity.

On Friday, Messham confirmed it had in fact been a cast of mistaken identity, telling the BBC he had offered "sincere and humble apologies" to McAlpine for making false allegations of sexual abuse.

"After seeing a picture in the past hour of the individual concerned, this (is) not the person I identified by photograph presented to me by the police in the early 1990s, who told me the man in the photograph was Lord McAlpine," Messham said in a statement, according to the BBC.

The BBC's decision to broadcast Messham's initial claim came as it conducted an internal inquiry into why "Newsnight" had shelved an investigation into Savile late last year, weeks before the organization screened tribute shows about his life and work. Savile, who presented music and children's shows on BBC, died in October 2011.

When its rival ITV aired allegations about Savile last month, the expose led to a widespread discussion of other, unrelated sexual abuse in Britain in the recent past ? including cases in Wales in which Messham was a victim.

Amid frenzied speculation, Cameron was on Thursday handed a list of individuals who have been the subject of internet speculation during an interview by ITV's "This Morning" program. In his haste, the show's presenter Phillip Schofield fleetingly showed the note to a camera, revealing some of the identities.

McAlpine said that rumors spreading online and the actions of the BBC and ITV had left him with little option other than to comment. "In order to mitigate, if only to some small extent, the damage to my reputation I must publicly tackle these slurs and set the record straight," he said in a statement.

The politician said that he had never abused Messham or any other child, and had never visited children's homes or a hotel in the Welsh town of Wrexham where the victim told the BBC that sex abuse had taken place.

The BBC said in a statement that its broadcast was in the public interest even as McAlpine's lawyer threatened to sue.

Meanwhile, Britain's television standards regulator Ofcom confirmed that it had received complaints about ITV's "This Morning" over its handling of the child abuse issue.

"The action of presenting a random list from the Internet of alleged 'suspects' to the prime minister, live on television, was a grave error of judgment," said Conservative lawmaker Stuart Andrew, who is among those to have filed a complaint.

Schofield, the ITV presenter, stressed it was never his intention to identify anyone on the list and apologized if viewers were able see names.

"I was not accusing anyone of anything and it is essential that it is understood that I would never be part of any kind of witch hunt," he said in a statement.

ITV said in a statement it was "extremely regrettable" that a "misjudged camera angle" may have made names briefly visible. The broadcaster echoed Schofield in insisting that the program was not making any accusations against anyone in particular.

-----------------

Associated Press writer Cassandra Vinograd contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/uk-broadcasters-warned-over-witch-hunt-175920883.html

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Search The Finest Properties In US - Work On the Internet

Real estate as one of the booming industry, the level of boom witnessed in the industry is directly affected by several external factors. When employment is one factor, trade and economic situation can be another. Whatever, the need for occupying a perfect home for the people never ends as long a they are living on the earth.

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Source: http://www.workoninternet.com/business/reviews/miscellaneous/219747-article.html

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6-time champ Federer reaches semis at ATP finals

LONDON (AP) ? On an indoor court, Roger Federer can win even when he's not playing his best.

He proved that again Thursday at the ATP finals, beating David Ferrer 6-4, 7-6 (5) and advancing to the semifinals with a group match to spare despite struggling to land his serve and scrambling to stay in the long rallies.

"I've been very successful over the years. Probably won most titles indoors, maybe more than all the other guys combined," said Federer, who called it a natural surface for him. "But that doesn't make me the best this week."

He is, however, the big favorite.

The two-time defending champion is looking for his seventh title at the season-ending event for the top eight players in the world. He is 2-0 at the O2 Arena, with his last group match against Argentina's Juan Martin del Potro on Saturday.

Del Potro beat Janko Tipsarevic 6-0, 6-4 in the other Group B match, improving his record to 1-1 and eliminating the Serb with two losses. But Del Potro still needs to beat Federer to advance.

"Win in two sets gives me a chance to go to the next round," said Del Potro, who traded shots with Manchester City striker Sergio Aguero after the match. "But before I need to beat Roger once again."

Federer made only 53 percent of his first serves against Ferrer. And in his first two service games alone, he was forced to save six break points.

But he did save them, and three others, while getting broken only once.

"I definitely needed a good second serve, especially in the first set," Federer said. "I didn't have that many serves in play the way I wanted to. Either the rhythm was off a bit or I wasn't pushing enough with the legs or whatever it might have been."

With the victory, Federer improved to 14-0 in his career against Ferrer. In 10 years of facing each other, Ferrer has won only three sets against the 17-time Grand Slam champion.

That looked like it was going to change Thursday.

Ferrer was on the run for the entire match, getting to ball after ball to extend rallies and keep Federer on the move. In the opening game, the Spaniard quickly took a 0-40 lead but failed to convert any of his three break chances.

He had three more chances in the third game ? minutes after the Swiss had broken Ferrer's serve ? but again Federer was able to pull through and hold.

"I had a lot of chances ... I can't do it," said Ferrer, who won the Paris Masters last week for his tour-leading seventh title of the season. "Sometimes with these players, if I don't take my chance, I don't win the important points; it's very difficult to win these matches."

Ferrer did finally manage a break to get back on serve at 3-2, but Federer didn't allow another. Both were forced to save break points in the second set, however. Federer saved two, and Ferrer one.

"Ferrer showed why he's so tough to beat. He makes you hit the extra shot. He makes it physical," Federer said. "You know that mentally he's not going to go anywhere."

Ferrer has a chance to overtake Rafael Nadal as the fourth-ranked player in the world, but he may need to win the title to achieve it.

"I don't think about that because Rafa is injured. For me, I don't care if I finish 4 or 5," Ferrer said. "I am trying to do my best to have a great tournament here. And after here, then next week I will have a very important Davis Cup final."

Tipsarevic was the first to be eliminated from the tournament. The Serb entered the ATP finals after retiring from his quarterfinal match at the Paris Masters because of illness.

"I wouldn't really blame my loss on the sickness. I am generally feeling fine," said Tipsarevic, adding that his lack of playing time was hurting his game. "I'm playing horrible. I'm playing worse than horrible. I'm playing the worst tennis that I played in a long time."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/6-time-champ-federer-reaches-semis-atp-finals-220051133.html

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Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

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Gas shortages lead to gray market even as lines shrink

1 hr.

Staff reports , NBC News

Shorter but persistent lines at gas stations in the Northeast and sporadic closures have led to a gray?market for fuel on Craigslist, with prices for delivery of a five-gallon container ranging from $30-$100 Tuesday.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's office opened a very preliminary investigation into the Craigslist postings, a spokeswoman told NBC News, adding?it was mainly within the context?of a broader probe, announced Monday, into price gouging complaints after Superstorm Sandy.

Craigslist was not immediately available to comment.

Drivers also turned to social media to find where they could buy gas legitimately. Twitter account @njgas kept its growing band of 6,400 plus followers posted with crowd-supplied updates on gas station openings, wait times, and rationing rules.

More of the major fuel refineries that supply the area had recovered from Superstorm?Sandy and reopened Tuesday, but 10 remained shuttered, Reuters reported, including two which contain twenty-five percent of the area's fuel capacity.?A barge bearing an additional 17.6 million gallons of biofuel will be allowed to berth and deliver badly needed fuel to New Jersey, thanks to a temporary easement of regulations by the EPA.

The bigger problem seemed to be ongoing?power outages. ?Without power, even if the gas stations have fuel, they can't run the pumps.

The Long Island Power Authority listed 200,428 of its customers remained without electricity on Tuesday morning, down from over 300,000 on Monday. In New Jersey, 582,000 remained without power, while Jersey Central Power & Light reported 257,884 outages, the AP reported. PSE&G, which had pledged to restore full power to homes by Sunday, revised that till later in the week.

In areas where power had been restored, more gas stations were able to open. This allowed cars to spread out at more pumps and decrease overall wait times. In Central New Jersey, lines had decreased Tuesday from 75-100 minutes over the weekend to waits of no longer than 5-10 minutes, driver?Michael Franken of Plainsboro told NBC News.?

In the?Queens borough of?New York, where gas line tensions over the weekend got so bad a man was arrested for allegedly pulling out a gun in order to cut the queue, some gas stations this morning had zero lines, resident?Paul Eng told NBC News. Others had half the size they did before. However, a number of stations remained closed in the borough.?

In other parts, high driver demand and ongoing station closures meant drivers were still experiencing long delays.?In Teaneck, N.J., lines ?are still long enough to cause traffic on Route 4 to come to a near standstill in various parts,? one?driver, Keith Kaplan, told NBC News. ?Annoying, since we are now causing the shortage.?

Experts say the backups at the pump won't completely end even by the end of the week.

?But the situation should at least be manageable," Ralph Bombardiere, head of Gasoline and Repair Shop Association of New York, told Reuters. ?While more (stations) now have power restored, the increased demand they're seeing is emptying the tanks faster than normal.?

Reuters contributed to this report.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/gas-shortages-lead-gray-market-even-lines-shrink-1C6883461

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Post-election: Bain & Co. exec speaks out - The ... - Fortune Finance

Senior executive with Bain & Co. reflects and looks ahead.

FORTUNE -- The long election season is now over, with President Obama appearing to have won reelection. Before the votes were counted, I spent some time on the phone with Phil Kleweno, head of the Washington, D.C. office for consulting firm Bain & Co., to get his thoughts on how the campaign affected his firm and on what his clients can expect for the next four years.

What follows is an edited transcript of our conversation:

FORTUNE: How has this election impacted Bain & Company?

The strength of Bain and Company is a brand built on our 40-year history of achieving results for clients, and the brand has never been stronger. The thing we do notice internally, however, is that everyone knows who we are now. And a lot of people are now able to distinguish between us and Bain Capital. I don't think it's really caused any change in our client relationships, because our clients know how we work and that Gov. Romney left our firm 20 years ago. CEOs recognize that 20 years is a very long time in the life of a firm.

You run the firm's Washington, D.C. office. If Democrats keep the White House and Senate, do you imagine any local blowback?

I haven't seen anything like that, or had any conversations with clients that would suggest that. If Gov. Romney were to win, we'd probably stay a household name and if he loses people will probably get on with it. But, as I said, I don't think it affects how our clients think about us. It helps, perhaps, that we're not actively involved in federal government work.

Most of the "Bain" media attention during the campaign has been on Bain Capital, rather than on Bain & Company. Did that surprise you?

That's an interesting point. I do think that it possibly speaks to the nature of the relationship we have with CEOs of companies, sometimes side by side, sometimes behind the scenes. They are Personal relationships, and I think a lot of people probably wouldn't come forward with confidential information because it's about their companies. We take great pride in the training we give our people and the types of work we do with our clients. We're a professional fee-for-services business, not a private equity model where we're buying companies.

I know this is a very vague question, but could you talk a bit about how your clients would be affected by this outcome's elections??

I think that no matter who wins, it's a pretty challenging 2013 for the business community. That's driven by the fact that most of the growth and sustained growth of the last couple of years has been from direct or indirect government stimulus. Regardless of who's in charge, a lot of changes will be inevitable. Something as simple as the payroll tax cut, which will disappear on January 1. ?If you take a family making $50,000 per year -- which is on-third of the GDP on the household income side and also the group hardest hit by unemployment -- that's going to be a $1,000 disposable income hit, which is significant. Things like that people aren't expecting, so any administration is going to face headwinds at the beginning that could be stronger than they currently seem. The way we look at it, a lot of that die already has been cast. We do see a stronger forecast at the latter part of that decade but, by then, there will have been a new election.

?You contributed to President Obama's campaign in 2008, but not this time around. Why?

In 2008 I was just attending a fundraiser with a friend who asked me to attend. My contribution history is not a statement either way.

Source: http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2012/11/06/post-election-bain-co-exec-speaks-out/

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