In the News
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December 7, 2021
Low-income households in Detroit spend at least a quarter of their disposable incomes on water and sewer bills, putting the city’s poorest residents among the hardest hit by rising water costs in Michigan, according to research by Jennifer Read, director of the U-M Water Center, and colleagues. “If we continue on this trajectory, more people are going to have challenges affording their water and more communities are going to run into problems,” she said.
The Detroit News -
December 7, 2021
“We can transition away from our current energy system, make communities cleaner while improving health outcomes and building jobs,” said Tony Reames, assistant professor of environment and sustainability and senior adviser to the U.S. Department of Energy, whose research suggests that new zoning codes could “reduce future energy needs and related carbon emissions for the tens of millions of homes that will be built in the U.S. in coming decades.”
Grist -
December 6, 2021
“The average person is probably getting about five grams of plastic per week into their body from what you eat, what you drink and what you breathe. … This is equivalent to eating a credit card every week,” said Anne McNeil, professor of chemistry and macromolecular science and engineering.
National Public Radio -
December 6, 2021
“You can’t separate this from the history of blackface, yellowface and redface in this country, even if you have the most sensitive actors in the world playing these characters,” said Apryl Williams, assistant professor of communication and media, and digital studies, on a corporate education company’s use of white actors to play black characters in virtual reality diversity training.
BuzzFeed News -
December 6, 2021
“In the hands of state legislatures committed to eradicating abortion access, and federal appeals courts stacked with judges nominated to do the same, abortion access will be dramatically curbed. … Clinics will close. States will have accomplished what overruling Roe in its entirety would allow them to do: eliminate abortion access in many states,” wrote Leah Litman, assistant professor of law.
NBC News -
December 3, 2021
Joseph Eisenberg, professor of epidemiology and global public health, says travel bans could help buy time for vaccine makers, but there could be a big cost in future reporting of new strains: “The cost-benefit obviously is if the ban results in these countries being less likely to do this kind of surveillance and provide this kind of information that’s incredibly valuable about new strains because they don’t want these repercussions of having these travel bans, then the net may be a negative with respect to the future.”
USA Today -
December 3, 2021
“Launching a new program like this is destined to be a failure. Poor families will be the most affected since they will have to navigate a system that not even policymakers seem to understand besides dealing with the uncertainties about the program’s future,” said Luciana de Souza Leão, assistant professor of sociology, on a program proposed by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to beef up financial assistance to the less fortunate ahead of next year’s election.
The Washington Post -
December 3, 2021
“We’re trying to bring people from different parts of the university — not only engineers, but we have people from across disciplines such as psychology, more human-machine-interaction type people, because there are lots of angles to this problem we are trying to solve when it comes to safety,” said Necmiye Ozay, associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science, on creating a group of varied thinkers to tackle the challenges of driverless technology.
BBC -
December 2, 2021
“Kids have been through enough these last two years. I think families recognize that, and don’t want their children to endure any additional trauma,” said Gabriel DellaVecchia, research fellow in education, who favors allowing parents to decide whether their child repeats a grade. “I don’t like the fact that it’s the government that tells (parents), ‘We’re going to retain your kid.’ This idea that you can’t learn later or get caught up is false.”
The 74 -
December 2, 2021
The more parents talk with their preschool children during shared TV time, the more likely those kids are to have higher curiosity levels when they reach kindergarten, says Prachi Shah, associate professor of pediatrics and psychiatry: “Our findings reinforce the importance of parent conversation to promote early childhood development and curiosity, especially for children from under-resourced families.”
Asian News International (India)
