Humanities & Society

Mary Butkus/WUSTL PhotoFoster care teens have a desire to attend college, study shows.A solid education is considered the foundation for a productive future, but for teens in foster care, education beyond high school is rarely a reality. In fact, a Westat study found that only 44 percent of 18-year-olds leaving the independent living program of the foster care system completed high school. But despite common thought, this dismal percentage is not due to a lack of educational aspirations among teens in foster care. According to a recent study at the George Warren Brown (GWB) School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis, a surprisingly high percentage — 70 percent — of teens in the foster care system have a desire to attend college.

Joe Angeles/WUSTL PhotoSobelGlobalization is creating divisive tensions between developed and developing nations. Many fear globalization, blaming it for their societal ills. Yet, globalization has produced opportunity and improvements in social welfare for those nations able to take advantage of its benefits. Nations who fail to take full advantage of globalization may have only themselves to blame, according to a study in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of International Management.

The recent decisions by Oklahoma and Colorado federal courts invalidating the Federal Trade Commission’s “Do Not Call List” were major victories for telemarketing companies, “but a tragedy for the rest of us,” says Neil M. Richards, associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “Even with the quick reversal of the Oklahoma decision by Congress and President Bush, the Colorado decision remains a major roadblock for the List,” notes Richards. “The FTC and the Federal Communications Commission have been warned by Judge Harrington in Colorado not to go against his order, and Congress has no power to overrule the judge’s decision- they cannot change the meaning of the First Amendment as interpreted by the Courts.”

October Culture & Living Tip Sheet

October Business, Law & Economics Tip Sheet

SadatLeila Sadat, professor of law at Washington University and one of the country’s leading experts in international and comparative law, discusses Bush’s address before the UN’s General Assembly and his proposals for the future of Iraq with Mike Sampson of KWMU’s St. Louis on the Air on Sept. 23. Listen to the program from the KWMU Web site.

Erik TrinkausA human jawbone (left), dated to between 34,000 and 36,000 years ago, along with a facial skeleton (center) and a temporal bone (right).A research team co-directed by Erik Trinkaus, Ph.D., professor of anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis, has dated a human jawbone from a Romanian bear hibernation cave to between 34,000 and 36,000 years ago. That makes it the earliest known modern human fossil in Europe. Other human bones from the same cave — a temporal bone, a facial skeleton and a partial braincase — are still undergoing analysis, but are likely to be the same age. The jawbone was found in February 2002 in Pestera cu Oase — the “Cave with Bones” — located in the southwestern Carpathian Mountains. The other bones were found in June 2003.

Former EPA administrators Carol Browner and William Reilly will deliver the first Sesquicentennial Environmental Initiative Lecture at 3 p.m., Friday, October 3. The lecture, which focuses on politics and the environment, is free and open to the public and will be held in Graham Chapel, located just north of Mallinckrodt Center, 6445 Forsyth Blvd., on the Washington University campus.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration will collaborate with Assistant Professor Jeffrey T. Macher of the Robert Emmett McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University and Associate Professor Jackson A. Nickerson of the Olin School of Business at Washington University in St. Louis as part of its strategic initiative to modernize the regulation of pharmaceutical manufacturing and product quality. Under the terms of the material transfer agreement with the FDA, Macher and Nickerson will conduct research and analysis to help the FDA identify the factors that predict manufacturing performance to further refine the agency’s risk-based site selection model for inspections as well as its other efforts to target identified risks to pharmaceutical quality and strengthen its pharmaceutical compliance program.

The George Warren Brown School of Social Work’s fall lecture series will address a broad spectrum of social issues, ranging from affirmative action to neighborhood capacity building. The series will kick off Sept. 24 at 4:30 p.m. with a lecture by Amitai Etzioni, Ph.D., director of the Institute of Communitarian Policy Studies, on ” My Brother’s Keeper: Reflections of a Communitarian.”