Issues

Julia Sneden wrote: Slow learners and average students, after all, do not necessarily learn less than "gifted" students. They simply learn at a different speed. They are often surprisingly thorough and reflective and creative students who retain what they learn as well as or better than those who learn things faster. Brilliance has no lock on perseverance or creativity. more »

There is little to guarantee that any vitamin, mineral, probiotic, sports supplement, herbal treatment, or other dietary supplement is safe, effective, or even contains what’s on its label. Last year a NY Attorney General's investigation found that several popular store-brand supplements at four major retailers — GNC, Target, Walgreens and Walmart — contained contaminants not listed among the labeled ingredients. Just 21 percent of them actually had the DNA of the plant species they purported to be vending. more »

Since 1990, cancer mortality in the United States has dropped by a dramatic 23 percent, and research shows that prevention efforts like more and better screenings and public education around risk factors like smoking can take credit for much of that progress. V.P. Biden's discussion with cancer experts such as NIH director Francis Collins and Nobel laureate Elizabeth Blackburn, now president of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies touched on the promise of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing to help find new ways to tackle cancer. more »

If the population shift continues, Texas could gain three new seats in the US House, Florida two, and Arizona, Colorado, North Carolina and Oregon one apiece after the next census, according to an analysis by Election Data Services, a political consulting firm based in Virginia. Nine states — Alabama, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and West Virginia — could meanwhile lose a seat apiece. more »