Political rhetoric seems more heated, and the discussion nastier, than ever. Listen to the IowaWatch Connection podcast, which includes suggestions on how we might get back to more effective political dialogue.
Education
Huge Debts Temper Job Searches For 2014 College Graduates In Iowa
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Plenty of seniors on Iowa college campuses interviewed this spring for an IowaWatch report on college debt and attitudes about finding a job have been in an ‘in-the-now moment’. They will graduate soon and many of them don’t have solid plans for paying the bills.
Business & Consumer Affairs
Special Report: Iowa’s Opportunity Gap
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This IowaWatch collaboration with four Iowa newspapers, published in fall 2013, is particularly pertinent during the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday period. It tells you how and why gaps exist in home ownership, jobs and pay, education and crime exist among white, black and Latino Iowans.
Education
Internet Insults Follow Transgender UNI Homecoming Queen Crowning
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Steven Sanchez’s life has been a whirlwind since becoming the first transgender student to win the University of Northern Iowa’s Homecoming queen competition on Oct. 11. Now, he is receiving negative feedback via Internet coverage of his unusual win, reading insults while being called a freak, pervert or an “it.”
Business & Consumer Affairs
Women Fighting Back On Video Game Misogyny
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Sex sells in the video game business but it often is based on portrayals of curvy women wearing suggestive clothing, if much at all, who are subservient to men during games. Some real women are fighting back, trying to crack what has been called a boys’ club.
Environment
Inspections Reveal Problems with Iowa’s Flood-Control Levees But Maintenance Lags
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Broad federal requirements are allowing many levees to fall through the cracks in maintenance and leave the reliability of others unknown, an IowaWatch investigation revealed. Levees that are inspected generally rate low, but repairs aren’t always made.
Council Bluffs
Breaking the Cycle: Meth Addiction in Council Bluffs
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Children of drug-abusing mothers are more likely to pick up drugs themselves, continuing the cycle of substance abuse. With the recent defunding of drug prevention programs in Iowa schools, there is one less tool in the effort to cut of the generational cycle of drug abuse.
Business & Consumer Affairs
Iowa Libraries Refocus Spending as New Technologies Change the Way People Read
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No longer limited to ink and paper, Iowa’s public libraries are spending increasing amounts of money on new technologies, such as eBooks and iPads. But it has come at a cost. Story includes database with information from every Iowa public library.
Criminal Justice
Graffiti: The Art of Expressive Vandalism
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Story includes a time lapse of an Iowa City graffiti artist at work and a photo gallery. Graffiti art is many things to many people, ranging from art to vandalism, but sometimes both. “People have always written on walls,” says Kembrew McLeod, an associate professor of communication studies at the University of Iowa.
Government & Politics
Political spending by outside groups goes unmonitored
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When it comes to telling voters who is spending money on political ads, Iowa fails. It got an “F” in a recent study on state disclosure policies for political spending by independent groups, or groups not connected to political candidates. Iowa was among 25 other states that received failing grades. This kind of anonymous spending threatens the transparency of elections, said Arthur Sanders, a political science professor at Drake University. If a group spends $10,000 on ads, voters have no way of knowing where the $10,000 came from.
Business & Consumer Affairs
Student Debt for Iowa’s New College Graduates Remains High
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IowaWatch project with college student journalists in Iowa shows that, despite growing numbers of state and federal programs aimed at improving students’ financial literacy and years of talk about Iowa’s high student debt, students continue to graduate with debt that will follow them long after they leave the classroom. This report includes video interviews from students affected by their debt.