OU Grad Talks About Foreign Reporting

Jay Cohen ('99), Associated Press (Sports Desk) New York City is interviewed by Associate Director Bob Stewart about his career, his internship with the AP in Jerusalem.

Workers Trade Places and Ideas At Honda

Workers who are transferred from Ohio to Japan -- and the other way around -- build their experience and share ideas on a whole new scale.http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/business/stories/2008/03/02/honda_trio.ART_ART_03-02-08_D1_BV9GDHF.html?sid=101

Now Comes The Tough Part In Russia

Two new works look at Russia’s economic progress as Dmitri A. Medvedev succeeds Vladimir Putin in the presidency.http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/02/business/worldbusiness/02shelf.html?ex=1362200400&en=6e0855fc4bcf427a&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

New Beijing Terminal Bolsters Airport

BEIJING -- With a simple flight from nearby Shandong, Beijing opened a $3 billion terminal Friday, bigger than the Pentagon and designed to evoke a mythological dragon. It marks one more milestone in the city's transformation before this summer's Olympics Games. With its new terminal, the currently overtaxed Beijing airport should be able to handle some 90 million passengers yearly by 2012 -- more people than the population of France -- and well over twice its current capacity of about 35 million.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120426886198802697.html

What Makes Finnish Kids So Smart?

Finland's teens score extraordinarily high on an international test. American educators are trying to figure out why.



High-school students here rarely get more than a half-hour of homework a night. They have no school uniforms, no honor societies, no valedictorians, no tardy bells and no classes for the gifted. There is little standardized testing, few parents agonize over college and kids don't start school until age 7.

Yet by one international measure, Finnish teenagers are among the smartest in the world. They earned some of the top scores by 15-year-old students who were tested in 57 countries. American teens finished among the world's C students even as U.S. educators piled on more homework, standards and rules. Finnish youth, like their U.S. counterparts, also waste hours online. They dye their hair, love sarcasm and listen to rap and heavy metal. But by ninth grade they're way ahead in math, science and reading -- on track to keeping Finns among the world's most productive workers.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120425355065601997.html

Could the Dollar Be On The Way Out?

The dollar has been the world's reserve currency for more than 60 years. What happens if people no longer want to hold dollars? - MT

Beaten down by fears of a U.S. recession, the dollar is falling with new speed -- creating severe challenges not just for the U.S., but also for sugar traders in Brazil, central bankers in the Persian Gulf and a host of others.The greenback's biggest detractors -- a small but growing group -- say the currency is in danger of eventually losing its place as the world's dominant currency. Jim Rogers, a well-known commodity investor and a former partner of famed currency trader George Soros, has a particularly bleak assessment: "The dollar is a terribly flawed currency and its days are numbered," he said in a recent interview. He cited the U.S.'s huge foreign-held debt as the biggest cause.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120423483765800801.html?mod=hps_us_pageone

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120424991252301815.html?mod=hps_us_pageone

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Dollar.html?scp=2&sq=Dollar&st=nyt

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/business/business-markets-forex.html?scp=1&sq=Dollar&st=nyt

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/08/dollar-doldrums/?scp=4-b&sq=Dollar&st=nyt

US Marine in Japan Rape Case Released

TOKYO (Reuters) - A U.S. Marine arrested earlier this month on suspicion of raping a 14-year-old girl was released by the Japanese authorities on Friday, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Okinawa, southern Japan, said. The 38-year-old Marine, Tyrone Hadnott, was released because prosecutors decided not to press charges as the girl had dropped the accusation against him, Kyodo news agency reported.The arrest had caused outrage in Japan and revived bitter memories of the rape of a 12-year-old schoolgirl on the island in 1995, which sparked huge protests against U.S. bases there and raised doubts about the bilateral security alliance.http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/news-japan-okinawa.html?hp

Blood Thinner Made In China May Be Tied To Deaths

Amid indications that more people may have died or been harmed after being given a brand of the blood thinner heparin, federal drug regulators said Thursday that they had found “potential deficiencies” at a Chinese plant that supplied much of the active ingredient for the drug. Baxter International, which makes the brand of heparin associated with the problems, and buys supplies from the Chinese plant, announced that it was expanding a recall to include virtually all its heparin products. Though Baxter produces much of the heparin used in the United States, regulators said the other major supplier would be able to meet the demand.http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/us/29heparin.html?ex=1362027600&en=25c527943d7f8c94&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Foreign Correspondent Christine Spolar to Speak

Christine Spolar, the Chicago Tribune's Rome correspondent, will speak to Ohio University students Tuesday about her career and life as a foreign correspondent. Spolar will speak to J467 students at 3:30 p.m. in Scripps Hall.

Since joining the Tribune in 2002, Spolar has reported on the U.S.-led war in Iraq and its aftermath, the deadly Palestinian intifada in Israel, political changes in Jordan and Lebanon and the challenges facing Egypt.

Previously, Spolar worked on the staff at CBS’ "60 Minutes II," where she was instrumental in producing several award-winning reports, including a story about an American pilot lost--and believed left behind--in Iraq during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The report won an Emmy for investigative journalism and a national award from the Investigative Reporters and Editors in 2001.

From 1984 through 1998, Spolar was a local, national and foreign correspondent for the Washington Post. She was chief of the Eastern Europe bureau from 1995 through 1998 and was responsible for covering wars in Bosnia and Croatia as well as the transithttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifion of Eastern Europe from communism to democracy.

From 1979 until 1984, Spolar was a reporter on the local and state desks of the Miami Herald.

Spolar is a 1979 graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and has a master’s degree in journalism from Ohio State University. She was a Fulbright scholar/lecturer at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia in 1992.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-christinespolar,1,5553857.storygallery

http://www.chicagotribune.com/media/flash/2006-02/20444568.swf

'Doomsday' Seed Vault Opens in Arctic

LONGYEARBYEN, Norway -- Norway opened a frozen "doomsday" vault Tuesday deep within an Arctic mountain where millions of seeds will be stored to safeguard against wars or natural disasters wiping out food crops around the globe."This is a frozen Garden of Eden," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said, standing in one of the frosty vaults against a backdrop of large discs made of ice.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg called the vault an "insurance policy" and added his own biblical comparison: "It is the Noah's Ark for securing biological diversity for future generations."

Svalbard Global Seed Vault, just 620 miles from the North Pole, is designed to house as many as 4.5 million crop seeds from all over the world. It is built to withstand global warming, earthquakes and even nuclear strikes. The vault, built by the Norwegian government for $9.1 million, will operate like a bank box. Norway owns the bank, but the countries depositing seeds own them and can used them as needed free of charge.http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/02/26/ST2008022601108.html?sid=ST2008022601108

Pakistan Attempt to Block YouTube Video disrupts Internet

Service on Google Inc.'s YouTube Web site was disrupted around the world for several hours Sunday after a botched effort by the Pakistani government to block access to a video clip critical of Islam.

The story began unfolding Friday when the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority, the nation's telecom regulator, ordered Pakistan's Internet-service providers to immediately block access to a specific YouTube video, which it said was so incendiary it could trigger riots. A senior official at the authority said it also contacted YouTube, requesting that the site remove the video. The authority argued the clip was a violation of YouTube's terms of service, which ban hate speech. YouTube has since removed the clip but says it doesn't comment on reasons for removing specific videos.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120395109205290503.html

FDIC readies for wave of bank failures

WASHINGTON -- The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is taking steps to brace for an increase in failed financial institutions as the nation's housing and credit markets continue to worsen.The FDIC is looking to bring back 25 retirees from its division of resolutions and receiverships. Many of these agency veterans likely worked for the FDIC during the late 1980s and early 1990s, when more than 1,000 financial institutions failed amid the savings-and-loan crisis.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120398607404892133.html?mod=hps_us_whats_news