Across Pennsylvania, the Invent Penn State innovation hub network has pivoted to deliver needed programming and services online, by providing online mentoring, webinars, virtual speaker series, and a Virtual Idea TestLab.

Penn State Harrisburg Intercollegiate Athletics recently honored the athletic, academic, and community achievements of its student-athletes during the 2020 Student-Athlete Award Ceremony video presentation.

Teacher-preparation programs need to better prepare teachers, and especially white teachers, to serve students and communities of colors more effectively, the report says.

Quiz Yourself: What are today's biggest challenges to teacher recruitment?

Like other Americans, liberal and conservative teachers perceive news sources' credibility differently. How does that affect their teaching of media literacy?

"There's a science of learning, and ... there's not a single teacher who couldn't benefit, I think, from knowing these principles," said the executive director of Deans for Impact, a group of education school leaders.

The Epson WorkForce ES-500WR delivers fast and accurate scans paired with a robust software package that will appeal to data-crunching offices.

The Fujitsu ScanSnap iX1500 is a well-built, accurate, and easy-to-use entry-level sheet-fed document scanner for home and small-office use.

Such compensation plans are rarely used in the private sector and can sometimes bring about unintended negative consequences, the analysis argues.

In a shocking display of ignorance, pay for performance has become reformers' blitzkrieg. Both common sense and research are being ignored.

Several states are implementing pay-for-performance salary plans.

Another dozen school districts have landed federal Teacher Incentive Fund grants, including one that will focus on paying principals and assistant principals for their performance.

Basing teachers' pay on merit might give a small boost to students' reading achievement—if teachers understand how it works.

In Denver, teachers will go on strike Monday to protest a performance-pay system that’s been in place for 15 years. The dispute is illustrative of a larger national shift away from differentiated pay.

States have made significant progress in providing the public-accountability report cards that the federal Every Student Succeeds Act requires, but many still have a long way to go to make them easily findable and understandable by parents, according to the latest analysis by the Data Quality Campai

States are taking advantage of the added flexibility given them under the federal Every Student Succeeds Act to adopt a wider range of indicators for measuring schools' educational progress, according to a report from the Learning Policy Institute.

New data from the National Center for Education Statistics find that principals at private schools tend to have more experience, 9.7 years on average leading schools versus 6.8 years for public school principals.

Teachers need coaching from proactive and intentional leaders who see everything in their buildings as their responsibility, writes guest blogger Michael Sonbert. Until then, teachers will bear the brunt of our national criticism.

Despite what people may read or hear from friends and family, there are no magical foods or pills that are guaranteed to protect against COVID-19, according to Wendy Richman, who teaches nutrition at Penn State Abington.

A Penn State Abington faculty member is teaching students enrolled to integrate the content into their daily lives to help them manage the impact of the coronavirus.

The annual Bertha Lear Art Exhibition showcases the best work by Penn State Abington students during the 2019-20 academic year.

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Penn State’s Sexual Assault Forensic Examination Telehealth (SAFE-T) Center is continuing to provide support to sexual-assault nurse examiners in local hospitals across the commonwealth through their innovative telehealth solution, which allows nurse examiners to partner with local-site nurses during live exams.

At its final meeting of the 2019-20 academic year, the Penn State Faculty Senate passed landmark legislation updating its full-time faculty hiring policy for the first time in more than 20 years, as one step in continued efforts to advance the University’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion.

The Penn State Board of Trustees Committee on Finance, Business and Capital Planning today (May 7) advanced a plan to adjust tuition schedules for the summer 2020 semester due to the ongoing financial challenges many students and families are experiencing as a result of COVID-19 disruptions. The measure will go to the full board for a final vote on Friday, May 8.

The Penn State Board of Trustees Committee on Finance, Business and Capital Planning today (May 7) approved a proposed interim budget of approximately $6.8 billion to support University operations. The proposal goes to the full board for consideration on May 8.

"With unparalleled technology support, digital and curriculum innovation, a flexible structure including our Commonwealth and University Park campuses, effective outreach programming, and a wide array of top-ranked academic programs, Penn State is uniquely prepared for the arrival of the Class of 2024," wrote President Eric J. Barron in a message inviting accepted students to attend a four-part virtual series titled "Welcome to the Penn State Community."

Zoom-bombings have been making headlines across the country this spring, and Penn State is no exception to the increase in security threats and breaches. To address these recent incidents in Zoom meetings, University-wide Zoom default setting changes will be implemented on May 11.

Bogotá, Colombia, Apr 3, 2020 / 04:04 am (CNA).- Diana María Toro Vélez was kidnapped on a September day, as she drove home from Mass in the Colombian city where she lived. She spent 453 days in captivity. And she says that God’s grace kept her hope alive during the ordeal.

“I left Mass one Thursday and was driving home in my car and when I got home they assaulted me. They asked me a few questions and took me away. They sold me to the guerrillas,” Toro told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner.

Toro, the mother of three, told ACI Prensa that during her captivity, she was sometimes forced to march a lot, one time for up to 15 days in a row.

“I clung to God. I cried and prayed a lot. I really held fast to God. I taught the kidnappers how to read and write. We prayed. There was a certain coexistence, and good things came out of the bad,” she said.

Toro, 41, was kidnapped Sept. 27, 2018, in Amagá, about an hour’s drive from Medellin. Her captors were criminals, members of a gang called “The Sorcerers,” who handed her over to Marxist guerrillas from the the National Liberation Army (ELN) for 48M pesos, about $12,000. The ELN reportedly asked 3 billion pesos, about $745,000 for her return.

Toro was released from captivity on Christmas Eve, 2019.

The Catholic Church in Colombia had appealed for her release, and the release appeared to be a goodwill gesture toward achieving some kind of peace agreement between the ELN and the country’s government. Public officials credited the Church with arranging the release.

Speaking to ACI Prensa, the young mom said that she was “very devoted to Our Lady of Guadalupe. When I was kidnapped I made a rosary and prayed it every day, praying a lot to the Virgin that she would allow me to be returned to my children. And God heard me, because I was released on Dec. 24, 2019.”

It was difficult, Toro said, to be “separated from my three children, one of them 3, another 4 and one 14 years old. Separated from my husband, my parents, my siblings, my family members, relatives and friends.”

“These were 453 days of anxiety, grief, sadness and despair. 453 days of living in the middle of the jungle, sleeping under a canopy, on branches, with snakes, scorpions, mosquitos and many other animals around,” she said.

Toro told ACI Prensa she subsisted on parrot, pasta, cooked banana, and rice. She had only two sets of clothes and infrequently bathed. 

“These were really hard days without knowing anything about my family, just with the certainty that God was with me, filling me daily with his strength and fortitude and firmly believing that if I woke up okay, my family was okay too,” she said.

“And God brought me out of that really hard situation. I saw that his glory and his mercy are immense.”

Toro said the ordeal has filled her with gratitude.

“I want to tell those people who in these times feel alone or in despair because of the situation we’re going through in Colombia and the entire world, that God is with us, he never has left us alone, especially now.”

“Let’s pray the rosary, let’s pray as a family. The power of prayer is immense,” she added.

 

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA's Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

 

On Monday, Pablo Escobar's brother started to take orders for a second foldable phone at the low price of $399. However, users who bought the first foldable phone from the company say their orders have yet to arrive. Instead, what they got was a book and a pamphlet.

Many of Penn State Behrend's student clubs and organizations have moved online due to COVID-19 restrictions. One benefit of the new model: It's easier to bring in guest speakers.

Penn State Behrend faculty member Michael Campbell has been named distinguished professor of biology. Campbell, who joined the college in 1994, also directs the Lake Erie Regional Grape Research and Extension Center.

Penn State’s Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) team reached new heights earlier this month when they participated in the regional finals of the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition for the first time.

The experiences that Chris Eggerman, a 2017 graduate, had while at Penn State gave him a glimpse of the challenges and rewards he would enjoy in a career, and, paired with his education in the College of Information Sciences and Technology, equipped him with the skills he uses in his current profession as a security adviser at Liberty Mutual.

Anna Squicciarini, associate professor of information sciences and technology, has received a Fulbright Cyber Security Award to conduct research in London in summer 2021.

As a student in Penn State's College of Information Sciences and Technology, Steve Ney learned critical skills, from coding to data design and architecture. Today, he applies that foundation in his "dream job" as a healthcare data analyst for Geisinger Health, where he uses those skills to help produce visual outputs for doctors and staff to utilize in caring for patients.

Fifty students of Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus have generated $71,063.48 in donations for the annual Penn State IFC/Panhellenic Dance Marathon (THON), held Feb. 22 to 23 in the Bryce Jordan Center at University Park.

The Infinite

Chef and food writer Letitia Clark talks Ella Walker through her debut cookbook, Bitter Honey - an ode to the cooking of Sardinia.

The exercise yard lies just below my window. Every day I pace around it 12 times before returning to solitary confinement. The King George V park in Bearsden, of course, does not resemble the interior of any jail and the restrictions on my liberty are minor in comparison to those who have been imprisoned down the ages.

Six accomplished seniors will celebrate the culmination of their collegiate involvement and success by representing the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications as student marshals for the Class of 2020.

Ten student teams will be funded to use AI for Good to build and submit a minimum viable product in the Nittany AI Challenge for a chance to compete for a portion of a $25,000 prize pool. Students were invited to submit their ideas to improve the world by providing solutions for problems within the areas of education, health, humanitarian challenges, sustainability and climate change.

The Centre County United Way will host #LIVEUNITEDLive, a Facebook Live concert featuring 25 performers with Centre County or Penn State connections, beginning at 6 p.m. April 24 as a fundraiser for 28 nonprofit human service organizations.