GEOGRAPHY EDUCATION

“Originally a religious holiday to honor St. Patrick, who introduced Christianity to Ireland in the fifth century, St. Patrick’s Day has evolved into a celebration for all things Irish. The world’s first St. Patrick’s Day parade occurred on March 17, 1762, in New York City, featuring Irish soldiers serving in the English military. This parade became an annual event, with President Truman attending in 1948. Congress proclaimed March as Irish-American Heritage Month in 1995, and the President issues a proclamation commemorating the occasion each year.”

See on www.census.gov

Every college in America should make it a requirement to study abroad. Why study Spanish in a classroom in Indiana when you could learn it in Bolivia?

See on www.nytimes.com

Russian media says exit polls show 93 percent of voters elected to join Russia, in a move the West deems illegal.

See on www.aljazeera.com

Russian media says exit polls show 93 percent of voters elected to join Russia, in a move the West deems illegal.

See on www.aljazeera.com

Insured people are all alike, but uninsured people are uninsured for their own reasons.

It can be tempting to think of ‘the uninsured’ as the poorest of the poor. But that’s not entirely the case. While people living below the poverty line are the most likely to be without health insurance, 28 percent of people who make between 100 and 200 percent of poverty level (up to about $23,340) lack coverage, as do 15 percent of those who make between 200 and 400 percent (up to about $46,700).

These maps, created by Kevin Johnson and used here with permission, show where people not covered by either private or public insurance live in each city. Johnson used the 2012 American Community Survey; higher uninsured rates are represented by red and orange colors.

See on www.theatlantic.com

“The breakthrough came in 1996, when a new class of antiretroviral drug called protease inhibitors was launched. These were used in combination with two older drugs that worked in different ways. The combination meant that evolving resistance required the simultaneous appearance of several beneficial (from the virus’s point of view) mutations—which is improbable.  With a viable treatment available, political action became more realistic. AIDS had been a “political” disease from the beginning, because a lot of the early victims were middle-class gay Americans, a group already politically active. Activists were split between those who favoured treating people already infected and those who wanted to stop new infections. The latter were more concerned to preach the message of safe sex and make condoms widely available, so that people could practise what was preached. Gradually, however, activists on both sides realised that the drugs, by almost abolishing the virus from a sufferer’s body, also render him unlikely to pass it on. They are, in other words, a dual-use technology.”

See on www.economist.com

I made a music video to share my own story as a Muslim woman in America. In doing so, I was expected to share every other Muslim woman’s story, too.

See on www.theatlantic.com

By the end of this month, it is likely that Vladimir Putin’s Russia will fully control Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. And it is clear that he aspires to much more.

See on www.foreignaffairs.com