READER SUBMITTED: Quinnipiac School Of Medicine Helps Students Interested In Health Care Careers

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The Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University is helping students across Connecticut determine their future career in the health care field through the development of a health career pipeline initiative, one component of which is establishing Health Professions Clubs for high school students.

The first Health Professions Club meeting was held on Oct. 29 at Hamden High School. Gabbriel Simone, program coordinator of health career pathways at the School of Medicine, led a group of 16 students through a series of tests and exercises that emphasized the different types of health professions and helped students identify their goals for the future.

After Simone distributed a health career pre-test around the classroom, Hamden High junior EJ Neri raised his hand. "What's a DO doctor of osteopathic medicine?" he said.

To join the club, high school students currently enrolled in targeted schools must write an essay demonstrating an interest in becoming a member. In return, club members receive career development support, invitations to information sessions on the college application process and visits to the University's Center for Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences. A maximum of 20 students are accepted from each school.

Each club member will also be assigned a Quinnipiac pre-medical studies undergraduate student to act as a mentor as they complete high school.

Charles Collier, assistant dean of health career pathways at the School of Medicine, said he hopes to reach a total of 150 high school students in the New Haven, Bridgeport and Hartford areas through the club initiative. "The Health Professions Club is a vehicle through which we can mentor, guide and direct students to a health profession," he said.

Besides Hamden High School, other schools currently participating in the program include: New Haven Academy and Hill Regional Career High School in New Haven, Hyde Leadership School in Hamden and Warren Harding High School in Bridgeport. The Connecticut Center for Arts and Technology (ConnCAT), a New Haven-based post-secondary career training facility, is also a participant.

"The more exposure my students get, the more information and tools they have to choose their health career," said Elaine Edwards, a Hamden High School teacher. "This program is a great bridge between high school and post-secondary education."

Monsurat Mimiko, a junior at Hamden High School, said she wants to find the right field in pediatrics that emphasizes interaction with patients. "I want to be more certain of what I want to do," she said. "And I have a ton of questions for my mentor already."

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READER SUBMITTED: Quinnipiac School Of Medicine Helps Students Interested In Health Care Careers

Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages – Part 3 of 4 – Video

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 3 of 4
Speaker: Suanna Bruinooge October 24, 2013, congressional briefing, "Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages," sponsore...

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 3 of 4 - Video

Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages – Part 2 of 4 – Video

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 2 of 4
Speaker: Alicia Billington, M.D., Ph.D. Candidate October 24, 2013, congressional briefing, "Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physic...

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 2 of 4 - Video

Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages – Part 4 of 4 – Video

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 4 of 4
Question and Answer Session October 24, 2013, congressional briefing, "Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages," sponso...

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Will It Be Enough? New Medical School Enrollment Data and Physician Shortages - Part 4 of 4 - Video

Bassett medical school’s popularity soars

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Cooperstown has proven an unexpectedly popular place for medical students.

When the Bassett Healthcare Network and the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons joined forces to start a new 10-student medical school program in the fall of 2010, officials predicted great things.

But no one foresaw the programs popularity with medical school applicants.

So far, it has drawn between 698 and 971 applications a year for just 10 slots, said Senior Associate Dean Dr. Walter Franck. That compares to 5,100 to 5,800 applications for 155 spots in Columbias regular medical school and MD/PhD programs, he said.

The program, along with a similar one between the University of South Florida and Lehigh Valley Health Network, is training the next wave of physician leaders with unique curricula that teach doctors about medical care and the health care system, said Henry Sondheimer, senior director of medical education projects at the Association of American Medical Colleges.

I think theyve both been overwhelmed with the interest in these programs, he said. I think they picked something for all the right reasons because God knows we need physicians who are going to be leaders in improving the health care system, but I dont think either of them, to be honest, anticipated the tremendous amount of interest that this would generate in this group of applicants and I think its wonderful.

Katherine Schwartz of Mount Sinai on Long Island knew she wanted to go to Columbia-Bassett as soon as she heard about it as a history major at SUNY Geneseo.

Schwartz, a member of the programs first class, was drawn by the opportunity to follow a group of patients in Cooperstown for a year.

That was the initial draw for me. It seemed to get at why I wanted to go into medicine, I guess, the emphasis on interpersonal relationships, she said.

And Schwartz, whos now applying for pediatrics residencies and considering a future in neonatology, said its lived up to her expectations.

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Bassett medical school’s popularity soars

Gujarat: Sardar Patel statue to be twice the size of Statue of Liberty – News X – Video

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Gujarat: Sardar Patel statue to be twice the size of Statue of Liberty - News X
Ahmedabad: As the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress slug it out over Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel #39;s legacy,Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi will unvei...

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Gujarat: Sardar Patel statue to be twice the size of Statue of Liberty - News X - Video

Liberty Reserve co-founder pleads guilty to money laundering

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The co-founder of Liberty Reserve, a now defunct virtual currency that was widely favored by the criminal underground, pleaded guilty on Thursday to money laundering and other charges.

Vladimir Kats, 41, also pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York to operating and conspiring to operate an unlicensed money transmitter business, receiving child pornography and marriage fraud, according to a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) news release.

The Liberty Reserve virtual currency business, launched in 2006 in Costa Rica, became a financial hub of the cybercrime world, handling more than 55 million transactions worth US$6 billion over seven years, according to the indictment against Kats.

Liberty Reserve's reputation somewhat tainted the view of other virtual currencies, including Bitcoin, for their quick embrace by the criminal world. Unlike Liberty Reserve though, Bitcoin businesses and exchangers have mostly sought to comply with global financial regulations.

Prosecutors linked Liberty Reserve with laundering proceeds from credit card fraud, identity theft, investment fraud, computer hacking, child pornography and narcotics trafficking.

Liberty Reserve didn't validate its customers' ID -- a key requirement in many countries -- which allowed people to register under false identities. A network of third-party exchangers in Malaysia, Nigeria, Vietnam and Russia directly handled deposits and withdrawals from customers, which kept Liberty Reserve at arm's length from traditional banking systems.

Kats was arrested in May when Liberty Reserve was shut down. More than one million people used the service, including more than 200,000 in the U.S., the indictment said.

A sentencing date has not been scheduled. Kats could face up to 75 years in prison if he's given the maximum sentence for each charge, the DOJ said.

Send news tips and comments to jeremy_kirk@idg.com. Follow me on Twitter: @jeremy_kirk

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Liberty Reserve co-founder pleads guilty to money laundering

Liberty schools look to close revenue gap

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As our economy slowly recovers from the 2007 financial collapse, the unfortunate after-effects of the Great Recession continue. One particularly ugly consequence is the financial meltdowns lingering effect on public school funding.

For simplicitys sake, you can think of public school funding as a pie made up of three primary pieces. The largest slice of the pie comes from revenue a school district collects from local property taxes. Then, youve got a smaller slice that comes from state funding and a tiny sliver representing federal funding.

So whats happened to these pieces of pie over the last few years? Theyve shrunk.

While the stock market may have returned most of its losses since the collapse, property values are still lagging. And state coffers are still stretched. Translation? Lower assessed property values and shortfalls in state education funding.

This puts suburban, bedroom communities, which cant rely on steady tax revenue from big businesses, in a serious bind. Take the Liberty Public School District as an example.

The Northland district has been accredited with distinction and on average performs in the top 10 percent of districts in the state of Missouri. As a result, it has seen steady increases in enrollment as families north of the river gravitate to new developments and great schools that are just a 15-minute commute from downtown Kansas City. Over the last few years the district has added hundreds of new students to its charge each year and anticipates adding 2,500 more by 2020.

However, while the number of students the Liberty Public School District is serving has grown since the financial collapse, the total assessed valuation of all property in the district, which makes up the biggest piece of the pie in terms of operating revenue, has shrunk. Homes are worth less, and the property taxes they bring in are now smaller.

To add insult to injury, the Missouri legislature is currently shortchanging school districts statewide by about $600 million a year because of its failure to meet the school funding formula it passed into law in 2005. For Liberty, that means a $4 million annual shortfall.

So whats a school district to do? Well, in the last five years the Liberty Public School District has frozen teacher wage scales twice, trimmed staff head count, rented portable classrooms in lieu of new construction and shaved $5 million from its operating budget in an effort to make ends meet.

But those cuts arent enough to fill a gap caused by demographic shifts and an economic downturn well outside of the districts control.

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Liberty schools look to close revenue gap

Virtual currency Liberty Reserve co-founder pleads guilty to money laundering

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The co-founder of Liberty Reserve, a now defunct virtual currency that was widely favored by the criminal underground, pleaded guilty on Thursday to money laundering and other charges.

Vladimir Kats, 41, also pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York to operating and conspiring to operate an unlicensed money transmitter business, receiving child pornography and marriage fraud, according to a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) news release.

The Liberty Reserve virtual currency business, launched in 2006 in Costa Rica, became a financial hub of the cybercrime world, handling more than 55 million transactions worth $6 billion over seven years, according to the indictment against Kats.

Liberty Reserves reputation somewhat tainted the view of other virtual currencies, including Bitcoin, for their quick embrace by the criminal world. Unlike Liberty Reserve though, Bitcoin businesses and exchangers have mostly sought to comply with global financial regulations.

Prosecutors linked Liberty Reserve with laundering proceeds from credit card fraud, identity theft, investment fraud, computer hacking, child pornography and narcotics trafficking.

Liberty Reserve didnt validate its customers IDa key requirement in many countrieswhich allowed people to register under false identities. A network of third-party exchangers in Malaysia, Nigeria, Vietnam and Russia directly handled deposits and withdrawals from customers, which kept Liberty Reserve at arms length from traditional banking systems.

Kats was arrested in May when Liberty Reserve was shut down. More than one million people used the service, including more than 200,000 in the U.S., the indictment said.

A sentencing date has not been scheduled. Kats could face up to 75 years in prison if hes given the maximum sentence for each charge, the DOJ said.

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Virtual currency Liberty Reserve co-founder pleads guilty to money laundering

Liberty Global names European mobile chief in 'quad' push

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FRANKFURT (Reuters) - U.S. Cable company Liberty Global (LBTYA) has appointed a European mobile chief as it pushes into wireless services to meet growing demand for television, broadband, mobile and fixed-line services - so-called "quad play" - from one provider.

The quad move could be a threat to operators in the crowded German sector as they scramble for a share of Europe's largest telecoms market.

Liberty said on Friday it had appointed Graeme Oxby as managing director of its European Mobile operations.

Oxby was director of Mobile & Home Phone at Virgin Media, which Liberty earlier this year bought in a stock-and-cash deal worth about $15.8 billion.

Liberty has been testing the waters as a so-called mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in Europe, including in Britain, Belgium and Germany - where it owns the No. 2 cable company Unitymedia KabelBW - but has not made a serious push so far.

MVNOs are operators who rent access on bigger rivals' networks and tend to sell cheaper mobile plans, often without a long-term contract and targeted at youth or ethnic niches.

In Britain, Virgin Media offers superfast wireless broadband services to businesses, which are increasingly looking to buy fixed, mobile and other telecom services from a single provider to save costs and simplify billing.

"In this new role Graeme will further develop Liberty Global's core mobile network to become a full MVNO operator in most of its European operations," the company said on Friday.

CABLE GOES MOBILE

A rise in demand for "quad play" services was the main reason that British telecoms group Vodafone (VOD.L) splashed out 7.7 billion euros ($10.4 billion) to buy Kabel Deutschland, Germany's biggest cable operator, this year.

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Liberty Global names European mobile chief in 'quad' push