Media Coverage

Carol Greider and the Nobel Prize

"Carol W. Greider, Ph.D., a 1990 Pew scholar in the biomedical sciences and now professor of molecular biology and genetics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, received the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, sharing the award with Jack W. Szostak of Massachusetts General Hospital and Elizabeth H. Blackburn of the University of California at San Francisco.

The three scientists solved the biology question of how chromosomes, which contain DNA molecules, can be copied in a complete way during cell division and how they are protected against degradation. They showed, as the Nobel Assembly put it, that “the solution is to be found in the ends of the chromosomes—the telomeres—and in an enzyme that forms them—telomerase.”

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Source: Trust Magazine

Celebrating School Success

Consider this: school meals can be healthy, affordable and appealing to kids. Hard to believe? Districts across the United States are proving it can be done...

Schools face many challenges in their mission to serve healthy food to students, including budget constraints, equipment and training limitations, and notoriously picky consumers. However, considering that nearly one in three American children and adolescents is overweight or obese and at increased risk for long-term health problems, it is vital that schools overcome those challenges. Because our nation’s schools provide meals to more than 31 million children each day, they can play a crucial role in supporting children’s health.

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Source: Kids' Safe and Healthful Foods Project

''Check Cashers, Redeemed''

"Twenty or thirty years ago, traditional financial institutions fled neighborhoods like Watts, and guys like Tom Nix, co-founder of the biggest chain of check cashers and payday lenders in Southern California, rushed into the vacuum."

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Source: The New York Times Magazine

''Children in U.S. Are Eating Fewer Calories, Study Finds''

"American children consumed fewer calories in 2010 than they did a decade before, a new federal analysis shows. Health experts said the findings offered an encouraging sign that the epidemic of obesity might be easing, but cautioned that the magnitude of the decline was too small to move the needle much."

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Source: The New York Times

''China Never Investigated Tainted Heparin, Says Probe''

"The Chinese government didn't pursue an investigation into contaminated heparin sent to the U.S. in 2007 and 2008, despite repeated requests from the U.S. for help, according to a congressional probe."

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Source: The Wall Street Journal

''Citizens Push For FDA To Prevent Food Poisoning Outbreaks''

"Six years ago, Bend resident Chrissy Christoferson's ten-month-old son suffered a ten-day struggle with what first appeared to be a touch of the flu."

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Source: Oregon Public Broadcasting

''COMMENTARY: Change is on the menu at schools across the country''

"On average, two of every three school children eat a National School Lunch Program lunch and consume about one-third of their total calories from that meal each weekday."

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Source: Hutchison Leader

''Congress Considers Limits on Credit Card Companies''

"Democrats in Congress are taking a swipe at credit card issuers and their increasingly creative reasons for raising fees on strapped consumers, sparking a well-financed duel over how to crack down on alleged abuses."

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Source: Philadelphia Inquirer

''Congress pushes back on healthier school lunches''

"In an effort many 9-year-olds will cheer, Congress wants pizza and french fries to stay on school lunch lines and is fighting the Obama administration's efforts to take unhealthy foods out of schools.The final version of a spending bill released late Monday would unravel school lunch standards the Agriculture Department proposed earlier this year. These include limiting the use of potatoes on the lunch line, putting new restrictions on sodium and boosting the use of whole grains. The legislation would block or delay all of those efforts."

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Source: Associated Press

''Congress Takes on Chemicals''

Congress is venturing into new regulatory territory with a recent ban on several varieties of the plasticizing chemicals known as pthalates. Usually government agencies regulate products on the market, but environmental health advocates say this latest ban shows Congress is picking up the slack on chemical regulation. Host Bruce Gellerman talks with Andy Igrejas of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Environmental Health Campaign.

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Source: living on earth

Considering the Context - Lifecycle of a Social Issue

Few people would equate grantmaking with farming, but the comparison may be apt. Farmers adapt their crop decisions to different variables of soil and climate and develop a keen sense for when their crops are ripe and should be harvested. Like a farmer, a grantmaker must consider conditions, timing and ripeness to be effective.

For a grantmaker, timing and ripeness occur not within a crop’s growth cycle, but within the lifecycle--or development stages--of a social issue. An issue goes through stages set off by events or societal shifts and is carried forward by how groups in society decide to respond. Because issues evolve in a social context that is constantly changing, a grantmaker can more clearly determine how it might address them if it has a framework to understand the lifecycle.

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Source: Trust Magazine

''Consumer 10.0: Food safety finally gets its due''

The incredible, edible egg - or at least those coming from two rodent-infested Iowa egg farms - caused 1,937 traceable illnesses from Salmonella enteritidis last year, which means the contaminated eggs probably sickened nearly 60,000 people nationwide.

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Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer