In an effort to address a projected $584 million budget deficit for 2009-10, the California State University Employee Union (CSUEU), that represents more than 16,000 non-academic employees, has voted to enter talks with CSU on the concept of two day per month furloughs. This option is under consideration rather than the contractually mandated non-retention and layoff language contained in CSUEUs labor agreement with the CSU. In addition, the Academic Professionals of California, that represents approximately 2,400 student services employees, has also voted to begin the same process.
Combined with changes initiated this month to Title 5 that would allow CSU flexibility to furlough management employees, a total of approximately 21,000 of CSUs overall workforce of 47,000 employees are committed to looking at furloughs as a way to address the budget deficit.
CSU has been meeting with the systems labor unions that represent the vast majority of its workforce to discuss the furlough option and expects to finalize the details of an action plan in the near future. Approximately 80 percent of CSUs budget goes toward employee salary and benefits, and the CSU is proposing to furlough all of its employees (with the exception of public safety personnel) in all classifications, including management and executives, to help close the anticipated budget deficit.
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Since 13 is the unluckiest of numbers, the Kingsmen Shakespeare Festival is kicking off its 13th season with what is considered the Bards unluckiest play Macbeth.
The Kingsmen Shakespeare Company decided to confront Lady Luck head on by mounting the play that has the most superstition attached to it. There is a long history of disastrous events associated with the production, starting with the first Lady Macbeth collapsing from a fever and dying. Actors still try not to mention the name of the play in a theater.
The curse lives on and within 24 hours of the Kingsmen casts first reading of the play, it struck twice. The lead actor suffered a detached retina and had to drop out, and another leading actor had to back out after being cast in a Hollywood project.
The show goes on, though. The roles have been recast and Macbeth will open Friday, June 26, and continue June 27, June 28, July 2, July 3, July 5, July 10, July 11, and July 12. All performances are at 8 p.m. in scenic Kingsmen Park at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks.
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Today the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) awarded Caltech’s Robert J. McEliece the prestigious Alexander Graham Bell Medal for his seminal contributions in the fields of information theory and coding. McEliece, the Allen E. Puckett Professor and Professor of Electrical Engineering, Emeritus, was one of the first researchers to study convolutional codes, which became a staple of channel coding for deep-space communications systems, including NASA’s Galileo mission to Jupiter.
McEliece studied at Caltech as both an undergrad and graduate student, earning a bachelor’s degree in 1964 and PhD in 1967. He became a professor at the Institute in 1982. “I’m delighted, shocked and thrilled to have my name associated with Alexander Graham Bell,” he said. “I never knew much about his life, but this is a real thrill. I wish my mom and dad were alivethey would understand.”
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Graduating MFA candidates from California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) will hold their culminating exhibition, Why Theory, at the Spring Arts Tower in downtown Los Angeles.
The exhibition runs from Saturday, June 20 through Saturday, June 27, 2009. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, June 20 from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Additionally, a screening of video work will take place at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (REDCAT) on Monday, June 29 at 8 p.m. Admission to all events is free.
Since 1970, CalArts has educated artists in an environment founded on experimentation, critical reflection and the exploration of new forms and expression. Each year, graduating MFA students from the School of Art organize and present an exhibition of their work, taking the strategic initiative on how they wish to introduce themselves to a wider audience. The venue for this year’s exhibition is the former Los Angeles headquarters of the Crocker Citizens National Bank, now the Spring Arts Tower.
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It’s 3 p.m., and the Interface exhibition opens in four hours, but Media Arts chair Barney Haynes is calm amid a sea of laptops and electronics. “It’ll all come together,” he says. “Well, most of it will.”
The exhibition, now in its ninth year, is the culmination of the semester’s work for several different courses related to technology and interactivity in art; this time the courses represented are Recombinant Media, Chain Reaction, and Intro to Max Signal Processing. These interdisciplinary studiosopen to all CCA students with junior standing or aboverepresent the college’s best and most idealistic intentions: a true mixing of theory and practice, and the bringing together of multiple disciplines into a situation that is intellectually stimulating, dynamic, and extraordinarily productive.
The students excitedly describe their projects. Kirby McKenzie and her friend Samantha have created an installation called Cakewalk, which is something like musical chairs. Participants walk around a patch of sod while music plays, then depending on where they’re standing when the music stops, a picnic basket may open to reveal the makings of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, which they are then invited to heat up on a Foreman grill and eat. In Lana Nichols’s choose-your-own-adventure installation piece, the user pedals a stationary bike facing a video screen and takes a virtual ride through a supermarket, a BMW dealership, and the San Francisco airport BART station. Kate Richards’s Toy Garden is an interactive flower garden that incorporates tactile interfaces, switches, speakers, and live grubs.
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26. June 2009
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