DENVER — American schoolchildren need to be in class more — six days a week, at least 11 months a year — if they are to compete with students abroad, Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Tuesday.
“Go ahead and boo me,” Duncan told about 400 middle and high school students at a public school in Denver. “I fundamentally think that our school day is too short, our school week is too short and our school year is too short.”
“You’re competing for jobs with kids from India and China. I think schools should be open six, seven days a week; eleven, twelve months a year,” he said.
Instead of boos, Duncan’s remark drew an unsurprising response from the teenage assembly: bored stares.
D.C.: New spy satellites approved
The Obama administration on Tuesday approved the purchase of new spy satellites and will buy more commercial imagery from the private sector to plug immediate gaps in satellite coverage. The new program will take the place of one that had been awarded to The Boeing Co. Boeing spent nearly $10 billion developing the secret satellite but ran into technical problems. the Pentagon pulled the plug in 2005 after Boeing exceeded its budget by $3 billion to $5 billion, according to industry experts and government reports. An intelligence official acknowledged the possibility that the massive contract could be awarded this year to Lockheed without a competitive bidding process.
Texas: Ex-Army nurse pleads guilty in hepatitis C case
A former Army hospital nurse accused of infecting more than a dozen patients with hepatitis C pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count of assault and one count of stealing drugs. Federal prosecutors said Jon Dale Jones, a 46-year-old retired Army captain, infected at least 15 patients with hepatitis C in 2004 at William Beaumont Army Medical Center at Fort Bliss, just outside El Paso.
Calif.: Church searched in case of missing girl found dead
Police investigating the death of Sandra Cantu, an 8-year-old girl whose body was found in a suitcase dumped in a pond in Tracy on Monday, searched Clover Road Baptist Church on Tuesday, a day after questioning its pastor, Lane Lawless, and taking a computer and other items from his home. The pastor’s wife, Connie Lawless, said they had been interviewed because they live down the street from the victim and their great-granddaughter played with her.
Brazil: Retrial in nun’s death
A Brazilian court on Tuesday ordered the arrest and retrial of a rancher acquitted of orchestrating the murder of an American nun in the Amazon. Para state’s top court reversed last year’s not guilty verdict for Vitalmiro Moura on a technicality, a court spokesman said. Moura is accused of masterminding the 2005 shooting death of 73-year-old Dorothy Stang. A native of Dayton, Ohio, Stang spent three decades on the Amazon’s wild frontier, working to preserve the rain forest and defend the rights of poor settlers whose lands were seized by powerful ranchers. Prosecutors contend Moura and rancher Regivaldo Galvao hired gunmen to kill Stang over a disputed plot of land.
Israel: Anti-missile system test
Israel successfully tested an anti-missile system designed to protect the country against any Iranian attack, the Defense Ministry said, perfecting technology developed in response to failures of similar systems during the 1991 Gulf War. The intercept of a dummy missile was the 17th test of the Arrow system, a U.S.-Israeli joint venture. Israeli defense officials said the interceptor was an upgraded Arrow II, designed to counter Iran’s Shahab ballistic missile. The Arrow project is being developed by Israel Aerospace Industries Ltd. and Chicago-based Boeing Co. at a cost of more than $1 billion.
Peru: Ex-president convicted
Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison Tuesday for death squad killings and kidnappings during his 1990s struggle against Shining Path insurgents. The court convicted the 70-year-old former leader of “crimes against humanity” including two operations by the military hit squad that claimed 25 lives. None of the victims, the three-judge court found, were connected to any insurgency. Fujimori also was convicted of two 1992 kidnappings.
From Herald news services
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