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Editorial: Digital devices distracting students from learning

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

The latest report on how poorly U.S. students are performing in math also includes an easy way to potentially improve classroom performance.The National Center for Education Statistics recently released the latest Program for International Student Assessment. It’s a standardized test given to students around the world, from 37 countries belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. It started in 2000 and tests students every three years, but COVID delayed the latest results by a year.The United States’ math scores dropped to the lowest level ever recorded on this test. The number of top-performing students dropped by 1.4 percentage points. The number of low-performing students increased by 8.1 percentage points. The United States now has the 10th-lowest math score among OECD member countries.By now, the reason for the dramatic decline should be obvious.“Across PISA-participating economies, at least half of students experienced COVID-related school closures ...

‘Devastating’: The Chicago Bears’ latest loss — with another blown lead in Cleveland — may cut the deepest

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

Eddie Jackson sat deep inside his locker stall at Cleveland Browns Stadium, slumped in disbelief. Jackson needed a minute to gather himself, to let the emotion settle in, to find the words to explain Sunday’s surreal collapse, a 20-17 Chicago Bears loss that took what was left of the team’s slim playoff hopes and blew them to smithereens.“Man,” Jackson said with his voice cracking. “I don’t even know what to say. There are obviously some plays we wish we had back. But this just … I don’t know man. This one cuts so deep.”Across the Bears locker room, defensive tackle Justin Jones was having similar difficulty figuring out what had just happened, how an afternoon full of defensive playmaking had ended with such anguish as the Bears were outscored 13-0 in the fourth quarter.“This is devastating,” Jones said. “Devastating. They all hurt. But this one hurt.”Safety Jaquan Brisker just kept shaking his head, stru...

Dear Abby: Thanks for the gift, DIL – I hate it

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

Dear Abby: My husband and I have been married for 18 years, so I know his family well. His mother and I have a cordial, but not warm, relationship that’s sometimes a lot of work. She has always been hard to shop for, but the last two times I’ve given her gifts (at Christmas and her last birthday), instead of a thank-you card, she actually returned the gifts with a note saying she’d never use them.Now I’m not sure what to do. It’s obvious we have different tastes. When I ask her what she’d like, she demurs and says something like, “I’m sure you’ll choose something nice.” If I don’t send her a gift, it’s sure to be taken as a rebuff. What are my other options? (For what it’s worth, my husband has been no help here and considers gifts to be wholly my territory.) — Clueless in OhioDear Clueless: It is a HUGE breach of etiquette to return gifts the way your mother-in-law has done. Now, if you must give he...

CDC warns of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever for those traveling to Mexico

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

KSWB -- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, along with San Diego County public health officials, are cautioning travelers to northern Mexico and Baja California of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. San Diego health officials reported back in November that a San Diego resident had recently died from Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, cautioning the public about the tickborne illness and travel to Baja California. San Diego resident dies from tick bite; health officials warn of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever In early December, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) followed suit, issuing a Health Alert Network (HAN) Health Advisory to healthcare providers and the public of the outbreak of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever in travelers to northern Mexico and Tecate, Mexico, including Baja California, Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Nuevo León, among other areas in northern Mexico.The CDC reported in December, five people had been diagnosed with RMSF since July 2023; every...

Some Trump fake electors from 2020 haven’t faded away. They have roles in how the 2024 race is run

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

VIRGINIA CITY, Nev. (AP) — Nearly two years after he signed documents attempting to overturn Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in Nevada, Jim Hindle thanked everyone gathered in a historic Nevada boomtown’s commission chambers and asked them to bear with him while he learned how to oversee elections in rural Storey County. Hindle was another replacement in what was a revolving door of county election officials across Nevada as the 2022 midterms approached. He had just unseated the interim clerk, who had stepped in after the prior clerk resigned.But Hindle’s tenure in the heavily Republican county is part of a trend across battleground states where fake electors have retained influence over elections heading into 2024. He is among six Republicans who were indicted this month by Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford for their alleged roles in attempting to overturn the election outcome in the swing state, which Democrat Joe Biden carried by more than 33,000 votes over the GO...

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court, to lie in repose

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The late Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court and an unwavering voice of moderate conservatism for more than two decades, will lie in repose in the court’s Great Hall on Monday. O’Connor, an Arizona native, died Dec. 1 at age 93. Her casket will be carried up the steps in front of the court, passing under the iconic words engraved on the pediment, “Equal Justice Under Law,” and placed in the court’s Great Hall. C-SPAN will broadcast a private ceremony held before the hall is open to the public, allowing people to pay their respects afterward, from 10:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.The last justice who lay in repose at the court was Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second female justice. After her death in 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic, mourners passed by her casket outside the building, on the portico at the top of the steps.Funeral services for O’Connor are set for Tuesday at Washington National Cathedral, wher...

What about Bob? Some NJ Democrats want Menendez to move on so they can fight for his Senate seat

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — For years in New Jersey, any Democrat weighing a run for statewide office had to grapple with an important question: What about Bob?It wasn’t a reference to the 1991 Bill Murray flick but to Bob Menendez, the incumbent U.S. senator whose political influence placed him atop the state Democratic Party food chain. He kept allies in line, helped anoint rising stars and had an important voice in determining the fate of both candidates and policy proposals. Even after a federal corruption indictment ended in a hung jury in 2017, Menendez continued to wield considerable power.The “What about Bob?” question is no less relevant now, though it has taken on new meaning. It still bears no connection to the movie, though it has cinematic qualities of its own. Menendez is facing federal charges that he secretly aided Egypt’s authoritarian government and tried to thwart a friend’s criminal prosecution in exchange for gold bars and cash. He and his wife, who was also char...

That’s a wrap: Bryant Gumbel and HBO’s ‘Real Sports’ air their last episode after 29 years

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — For the last few years of its life, HBO’s “Real Sports” taped its episodes on the same Manhattan block where CBS’ “60 Minutes” resides. They shared a sensibility along with a neighborhood.But while “60 Minutes” rolls along in its sixth decade, the monthly sports magazine helmed by Bryant Gumbel is calling it quits in its 29th year. The final, 90-minute episode premieres Tuesday at 10 p.m. Eastern.Sports was a lens through which the magazine looked at all manner of issues, winning awards for pieces on corruption at the International Olympic Committee, labor abuses as Qatar prepared for the World Cup, concussions in sports and children forced to be jockeys for camel races in the Middle East.“Real Sports” told some inspirational stories, like Mary Carillo’s profile of the Hoyts, a father who ran marathons pushing the wheelchair of his cerebral palsy-afflicted son, and flashed humor.Who won or lost? There were other guys for that.“I’m OK,” Gumbel ...

How the White House got involved in the border talks on Capitol Hill — with Ukraine aid at stake

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — White House chief of staff Jeff Zients recently heard from a powerful Democratic senator that steep levels of migration at the U.S.-Mexico border had become, in a word, untenable. Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat, had signed onto a statement denouncing “reports of harmful changes to our asylum system” that were being proposed as part of a border deal on Capitol Hill. Yet Durbin, a veteran of numerous immigration battles, had also received concerning briefings from border officials and seen firsthand how the rising number of asylum-seekers had overwhelmed resources in his Midwestern state. So when Zients dialed Durbin one weekend this month for a temperature check on the ongoing border talks, the senator was candid.“I told him I thought the current situation is unsustainable, and the Democrats need to be part of the solution,” Durbin said. President Joe Biden’s top aide signaled the White House felt the same way, stressing to Durbin that “we have ...

A gloomy mood hangs over Ukraine’s soldiers as war with Russia grinds on

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:46 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A gloomy mood hangs over Ukraine’s soldiers nearly two years after Russia invaded their country.Despite a disappointing counteroffensive this summer and signs of wavering financial support from allies, Ukrainian soldiers say they remain fiercely determined to win. But as winter approaches, they worry that Russia is better equipped for battle and are frustrated about being on the defensive again in a grueling war. Some doubt the judgment of their leaders.Discontent among Ukrainian soldiers — once extremely rare and expressed only in private — is now more common and out in the open.In the southern city of Kherson, where Ukraine is staging attacks against well-armed Russian troops on the other side of the Dnieper River, soldiers are asking why these difficult amphibious operations were not launched months ago in warmer weather.“I don’t understand,” said a commander of the 11th National Guard Brigade’s anti-drone unit who is known on the battlefield as Boxer. ...