May Day
May Day, when the weather cooperates, celebrates a time of year when the intoxicating beauty of Spring reaches even the most frozen, internet-addicted soul. Known as Beltane in the Celtic Wheel of the Year, it is a worker’s holiday in much of the world. May Day stands across the Wheel from another disreputable holiday the [...]
Honor a Social Worker in Rhode Island Today!
It’s National Social Work Month. For that reason, I would like to honor some of the amazing social workers in the state of Rhode Island including Kate Coynemccoy, Kate Brewster, Maria Cimini, and Pamela Lischko Lowell. There are many other great social workers in Rhode Island. If you happen to know of one, please add them to this post.
Some Historical Context on the Prayer Banner Controversy
My overall analysis is that the real problem we have right now in Rhode Island is not that the Cranston Schools had a banner hanging in an auditorium that had a prayer on it. The real problem is that our economy is sagging big time, and we need to figure out how to turn that [...]
Reading My Tea Leaves About Achievement First
If I had to call it, my call at this point would be that the Board of Regents will vote to approve one, and only one, Achievement First School to start up in Providence. I have followed this issue closely for the past year, though I am by no means an insider to the process. [...]
President Ruth Simmons
Brown University is a short walk away from my house, but unless I’m cutting across the quad, university business is not on my radar. I can only name two Brown presidents– Vartan Gregorian and Ruth Simmons. I think it’s because both reached out to the greater community and all the students of Providence, and both [...]
Cranston Community Protects Education from Corporate Take-Over
And it wasn’t even close. The Board of Regents voted 7-1 to reject the proposed Achievement First Mayoral Academies proposal. Projo blog has the details here. The politicians lined up one after another to consent to this proposal: Allan Fung, House Speaker Gordon Fox, various members of the Providence City Council and members of the [...]
John E. Shibilio
The Westerly Sun has an obituary for John E. Shibilio who passed away June 8. There is no mention of the heroic ambulance transport from Wood River Junction to Rhode Island Hospital, and this may not even be the same John Shibilio. But Rhode Island is small, and I’ve been getting a lot of hits [...]
Live From Louis’ Diner
The stars are in conjunction. I have the day off, the sun is out and I’m at Louis Family Restaurant on Brook Street. I used to come here when Louis and Dom ran it, and my mother used to come here too. Same pictures on the wall, new ones pasted over the old ones. And [...]
Rhode Island’s Nuclear Fatality–Part I
This is in memory of Robert Peabody, a husband and father working a second job to support his family, assigned to a dangerous task in an unsafe workplace, poisoned by a nuclear reaction. There are lessons to learn, may we not forget them. It’s been almost thirty years since the Three Mile Island disaster put [...]
Mayor Taveras Inauguration
I am typing this with frozen fingers, because for inexplicable reasons we do these things in January. But it was a beautiful sunny day and hundreds were there for the civic occasion. Some local color– there was a man with a beautiful white bulldog wearing a tuxedo (the dog, not the man). The two ministers [...]
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