GV PS

Paid Community Organizing Training Program

The Direct Action & Research Training (DART) Center is currently accepting resumes from alums and spring graduating GVSU students interested in social and economic justice issues for their paid, four-month community organizing training program known as the DART Organizers Institute.

The DART Center has built non-partisan community organizations throughout the country that have won important improvements on a broad set of issues affecting low-moderate income people including:

· Education reform in low-performing public schools
· Job Training
· Drugs and Violence
· Affordable Housing
· Criminal Recidivism
· Neighborhood Revitalization, etc.

The DART Organizers Institute starts June 15, 2008 and combines a 7-day classroom with 15-week field training. Organizer Trainees will learn such things as:

· Entering a community
· Identifying and training local leaders
· Strategic planning and issue cutting
· Relationship and community building
· Direct Action on community issues
· Fundraising

This is a paid training program designed to promote successful graduates into permanent salaried positions making up to $35,000/year in starting salaries, plus benefits. Graduates from the DART Organizers Institute have gone onto accept Executive Director and Associate Community Organizing positions throughout the country. We continue to train the best of those working to build the power of low-moderate income neighborhoods to win victories on important issues in their community.

To apply, Grand Valley State University students must send an updated resume and completed application to: Ben MacConnell, the Recruitment Director at: institute@thedartcenter.org before March 17, 2008. You can also call him with questions: (785) 841-2680. To find out more about the DART center, check out our website: www.thedartcenter.org

A Light Hearted Look at the Serious Subject of the American Presidency

GVSU's Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies is proud to host HW Brands, award winning historian and author of 20 books as a Scholar in Residence. From March 10-12, Professor Brands will give a total of 6 different lectures, under the theme "That Man in the White House: A Light Hearted Look at the Serious Subject of the American Presidency." Tickets are $10.00 per lecture, but all (high school and college) can attend for free with a valid student ID. Seats can be reserved at www.allpresidents.org, unless reserving student seats. Please call the Hauenstein Center's main line at (616) 331-2770 to reserve student seats. If you have questions please feel free to contact me either via e-mail or my direct line (616) 331-7072. The schedule is as follows:

Monday, March 10
10 AM in the Richard M. DeVos Center
The Half-Step Rule
(Timing, Timing, Timing)

7:30 PM at the Gerald R. Ford Museum
Loyal to a Fault
(Why Nice People Make Lousy Presidents)

Tuesday, March 11
9 AM in the Richard M. DeVos Center
Sam Goldwyn's Secret
(Sincerity is Everything; Learn to Fake It and You'll Go Far)

2:30 PM in the Cook-Dewitt Center
They Don't Vote in Montevideo
(All Foreign Policy is Local)

Wednesday, March 12
10 AM in the Richard M. DeVos Center
Leave Under a Cloud
(and the Sun is Sure to Shine)

7:30 PM in the Richard M. DeVos Center
Dance with Them that Brung You
(Remember Who You Work For)

* All lectures in Grand Valley's Richard M. DeVos Center will take place in Loosemore Auditorium in Building E.

Position Available at Law Firm

Thanks to a GVSU poli sci alum for sending this along:

Who: 1-2 current students or recent graduates
What: Part-time (20-25 hrs per week) data-entry position and other misc. legal assistant work
Where: Stenger & Stenger, P.C. 4095 Embassy Drive SE Grand Rapids, MI 49546
When: ASAP
Rate: $10.00 per hour

Flexible scheduling & opportunity for promotion.

Send resume and cover letter to:

Angela Roberts
angela@stengerlaw.com

Professors King and Moiles Appear on To the Point

GVSU political science professors Erika King and Roger Moiles appeared on Wood TV8's To the Point yesterday. Click here for the video.

Dr. Miller-Adams in The Economist

Our very own Dr. Michelle Miller-Adams is quoted in The Economist. The article is about the Kalamazoo Promise.

Media Portrayals of Arabs and Muslims: Progress or Progressively Bad

You are invited to a lecture by Laila Al-Qatami, Communications Director of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.

Feb. 21, 1 p.m. in the Grand River Room

Title: "Media Portrayals of Arabs and Muslims: Progress or Progressively Bad?"

Dr. Jud Newborn Presentation: Defying Hitler

The Cultural Council of the Jewish federation of Grand Rapids would like to
invite you and your students to a presentation by Jud Newborn, PhD:

Topic: Defying Hitler: Germany's White Rose Student Resistence and its
lessons for confronting terror today

Saturday, March 8th

There is a special student fee of $ 5.00. If you are planning on a group
participation, please let me know and we will make a special group fee.

Download JudNewbornFlyer1.pdf

For further information, please contact:

Sari Hausmann Cohen
Programming Director
Jewish federation of Grand Rapids
4127 Embassy Drive SE
Grand Rapids, MI 49546
(616) 942-5553
(616) 942-5780 fax
sari@jfgr.org

ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarship

The American Bar Association is seeking applicants for the Legal Opportunity Scholarship. Here is some information about the scholarship from the ABA:

As part of President Paul's initiative to increase diversity in the legal profession and at his request, the ABA Board of Governors, at the Annual Meeting in Atlanta, established the ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund. The Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund, established within the Fund for Justice and Education, is intended to encourage racial and ethnic minority students to attend law school and to provide financial assistance to those in need.

The goals of President Paul's diversity initiative are to increase minority participation in the legal profession by encouraging members of racial and ethnic minorities to consider law as a career and to provide increased opportunities for minorities already in the profession. Financial aid to minority law students is an essential part of the initiative.

The ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarships were awarded beginning with the 2000-2001 academic year. The Scholarship Fund awards $5,000 of financial assistance annually to each scholarship recipient attending an ABA-accredited law school. Assuming the recipient achieves satisfactory performance in law school, an award made to an entering freshman may be renewed for two additional years, resulting in financial assistance totaling $15,000 during his or her time in law school. A scholarship committee, comprised of representatives from ABA entities, the national minority bar associations and at-large members, has been created to screen the applicants for the Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund.

For more information or an application, see the scholarship website.

The deadline is March 1.

Dr. Tafel to Moderate Panel on Putin

Dr. Heather Tafel will be a panelist on "Putin's Long Shadow: Russia's Future," at 6 p.m. Feb. 19 in Western Michigan University's Fetzer Center, part of the Great Decisions Lecture Series hosted by the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan. For more information on the lecture series, see the World Affairs Council website.

Dr. Walhof Wins Student Award for Faculty Excellence

Dr. Darren Walhof has won the Student Award for Faculty Excellence. This honor was awarded to him at the President's Ball on Friday night. Congratulations to Dr. Walhof!