Human Behavior

Common ground is harder to find, but worth seeking – Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Life experiences shape how we see ourselves and how we as a people relate to one another.

In earlier times, those life experiences were similar among those who lived in a certain area or even in a particular country. People rarely traveled any significant distances and spent their lives in the same area among the same people with whom they had much in common. Thus was born the concept of community, though humans being humans, there likely were disagreements. Still, similar experiences led to a common theme, a common purpose, an understanding of one another, a bond.

As they were forming a new country, most Americans in the 19th century traced their roots to northern Europe, with the exception of Africans brought here as slaves, and the culture was mostly agrarian. In 1900, despite the advent of the Industrial Revolution, a majority of Americans still lived in rural areas.

But change was coming. U.S. cities grew by 15 million people from 1880 to 1900 with much of the growth fueled by a massive influx of immigrants. According to the website History.com, some 20 million people came to the United States between 1880 and 1920, most from central, eastern and southern Europe. Included in that group were more than 4 million Italians. The Jewish population also grew dramatically with some 2 million coming in that same time frame, many fleeing religious persecution.

These changes meant people who spoke a different language, practiced a different religion and celebrated different holidays were now a part of the American fabric.

Still, some things stayed the same. Most households included a married couple and a number of children. The men farmed or worked for a paycheck to support the family and the women took care of the children and managed the household. Life expectancy in 1900 was much lower than today, with men living to an average of 43 years and women two years longer. Most of their lives was consumed by raising children.

A notable group of Americans, former African slaves and their offspring, did not benefit from the changes that were lifting much of America to a higher standard of living as the 20th century dawned. Discriminatory laws and practices kept them separate from their fellow Americans and thus they created a culture all their own. They shared a common history and a common reality.

The same was true, to a lesser degree, of many of the immigrant groups that tended to live near one another and shared a life filled with similar experiences. Still, most Americans lived lives that resembled one another.

Keeping a family going was an all-consuming task, but what little leisure time was available was often spent with neighbors and relatives who usually lived nearby and had shared experiences. People ate the same food, read the same newspapers, celebrated the same occasions, followed the same baseball teams and attended the same churches.

With the advent of radio, families would gather around to listen to the same programs. Television had a similar effect on family life and people across the country now were seeing the same programs and news reports. Their view of the larger world was shaped by these shared experiences.

All that seems so quaint today. Families are smaller and far less similar. In 1960, 73% of children lived in a family with a mother and father married for the first time. The Pew Research Center reports that percentage has fallen to 46 today.

At the same time, the information age has brought a wide range of vehicles for communication. Neilsen reports that Americans aged 18 and older spend more than four hours a day watching television and three hours interacting with their smartphones. But with a proliferation of cable television, streaming services and social media, there is no common experience. Newspaper circulation has fallen dramatically in recent years and fewer people are attending religious services.

Diversity can be seen as a good thing. In fact, a Pew Research Center report released last May indicated that 57% of Americans believe a diverse population is a very good thing for the country and another 20% say this is somewhat good.

That is encouraging news, but more than ever America has become a nation of many perspectives born of different life experiences. The challenge comes in finding consensus on issues including how the nation should be governed, what is acceptable human behavior and how thorny issues should be resolved.

Our future as a nation depends on finding common ground on what it means to be American while still honoring the lives, beliefs and traditions of all people.

Kathy Silverberg is former publisher of the Herald-Tribunes southern editions. She can be reached at kathy.silverberg@comcast.net or followed on Twitter @kdsilver.

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Common ground is harder to find, but worth seeking - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Human Behavior

The surveillance-industrial complex is targeting our kids – MinnPost

MinnPost photo by Tony Nelson

Minnetonka Public Schools Superintendent Dennis Peterson signed a three-year contract, at $23,500 annually, with a company that pledged to alert the district to threats shared publicly.

A few months ago, MinnPost reported on a concerning contract between Social Sentinel (a surveillance company) and Minnetonka Public Schools that largely went under the radar. A growing number of surveillance and data-sharing efforts have emerged in the Twin Cities in recent years using a mix of tactics to spy on youth. Tapping into public fears related to school shootings, bullying, and unfounded fears regarding the threat of terrorism, surveillance efforts have become rationalized as an acceptable prevention practice at the expense of young peoples civil rights and free expression. The idea that patterns of behavior can be tracked and used to identify the warning signs of potential violence continues to have a firm footing within our school system.

Tracking of behavior classification, intervention, and academic performance are now becoming the basis for surveillance of youth with unaddressed needs. Measures like these further distance us from addressing the root causes that fuel crime and incarceration. It is an investment in the permanence of rigid inequities and continued reliance on punitive measures. In lieu of an investment in qualitative approaches to community and relationship, there is now an incentive to militarize the relationship between young people and those whove promised to protect them. What this does is serve the interest of corporate analytics companies and law enforcement bodies by well-meaning school administrators who are in search of low-cost ways to promote safety at the expense of students greater well-being. The missing piece is the aim to address the needs of children/youth and their families. In these quiet, seemingly innocuous ways, the unobjectionable language of surveillance has crept into our schools.

Here are some examples of how surveillance has materialized in our schools in addition to Minnetonka Public Schools agreement with social media surveillance firm Social Sentinel:

We believe these aforementioned programs are indicative of surveillance systems due to a number of characteristics, including:

The stated purpose behind many of these efforts is to streamline the availability of services for communities experiencing disparities or inequities. The optimistic take on this would have us believe that the algorithms on which these programs are built are objective and evidence-based. Experience tells us otherwise.

Instead, algorithmic decisions are the product of inputs which themselves are premised on biased information, and often lead to silly interpretations. Consider this fact from the Brennan Center for Justice: Algorithmic tone and sentiment analysis, which senior DHS officials have suggested is being used to analyze social media, is even less accurate. One tool flagged posts in English by black and Hispanic users like Bored af den my phone finna die!!!! (which can be loosely translated as Im bored as f*** and then my phone is going to die) as Danish with 99.9 percent confidence.

Writer and philosopher Emma Goldman once said, A society gets all the criminals it deserves. What she meant, of course, is that criminality is defined by the powers-that-be, and in some societies, that they mirror the values, biases, and priorities of those in power. Put simply, what we invest in says a lot about what and who we value, as well as the ways in which conversations around public safety are framed to tee up policies/practices around security. The fact that our schools continue to invest heavily in surveillance efforts says more about our distrust of children/youth and our commitment to cultivating the cradle-to-prison algorithm. Because it is easier to fix broken people than to do the work of transforming a broken system, those in power are exploiting the struggles of some students mostly poor youth of color to justify disproportionate scrutiny.

Ramla Bile

Dominique Diaddigo-Cash

In fact, the Brennan Center reports that social media monitoring has been used to target racial and religious minorities, and to police speech that is seen as dissent. From the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to the current Black Lives Matter movement (labeled Black identity extremists), activists have been targeted by law enforcement bodies through surveillance tactics at the expense of the civil, political, and human rights. In the early adoption of programs such as the one in Minnetonka, little consideration has been given to the impact of such programs on the civil rights of children, youth, and their families, particularly since:

Kids do better when they are connected to caring adults, and when we can create a community of belonging that embraces the whole child. We cant replace the need for human-to-human connection with analytics systems. And while private corporations rush in with prescribed solutions to the behavior problem with no lens for equity or racial analysis on how surveillance works, were exposing our children to law enforcement. In addition to grossly violating the privacy of children/youth, we need to acknowledge that surveillance is a form of systemic racism. Institutional surveillance is a leading contributor to mass incarceration. Normalizing such practices minimizes the harmful impact of surveillance.

Ramla Bile is a Twin Cities-based writer and activist who challenges the surveillance apparatus and the ways systems criminalize BIPOC communities. Dominique Diaddigo-Cash is a writer and community organizer whose life and work explores the impacts of state violence on marginalized peoples and identities.

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The surveillance-industrial complex is targeting our kids - MinnPost

Human Behavior

Film on undocumented queer activist to be screened – UB Now: News and views for UB faculty and staff – University at Buffalo Reporter

The Department of Theatre and Dance will present a free screening on Feb. 5 of Forbidden: Undocumented and Queer in Rural America, an award-winning, feature-length documentary about an undocumented queer activist fighting for equality.

The screening will take place at 7 p.m. in the Screening Room in the Center for the Arts, North Campus. It will be followed by a Q-and-A with the subject of the film, Moises Serrano, and the films director, Tiffany Rhynard, who is an artist-in-residence with the Department of Theatre and Dance this week.

Forbidden tells the story of Serrano, whose parents brought him from Mexico to the U.S. as a baby. After 23 years growing up in the rural south as an undocumented gay man, he is forbidden to live and love in the country he calls home and sees only one option to fight for justice.

Rhynard is an artist, dancer and filmmaker whose work examines the complexity of human behavior and addresses social issues. Her choreography, dance films and documentaries have been presented nationwide and internationally.

Her recent dance documentary short, Black Stains, about black male identity in the United States, is currently screening at film festivals. The film was created in collaboration with Trent D. Williams Jr.

As a performer, Rhynard has danced for such choreographers as Gerri Houlihan, Laura Dean Dancers and Musicians, and Chavasse Dance and Performance Group. She has taught at colleges and universities throughout the country and currently is an assistant professor in the School of Dance at Florida State University.

Serrano served as a producer and one of the cinematographers for Forbidden. His mission is to de-criminalize and humanize the issue of migration while advocating for immediate relief to migrant communities.

Forbidden earned the first-ever Social Justice Film Award from the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Freedom Award from Outfest Film Festival.

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Film on undocumented queer activist to be screened - UB Now: News and views for UB faculty and staff - University at Buffalo Reporter

Human Behavior

Philadelphia looks to evidence-based insights to inform policy – Penn: Office of University Communications

Philadelphia city employees as well as researchers from Penn and other institutions around the city and country gathered on Jan. 24 for a conference aimed at providing evidence-based insights from social science that could be put to work to benefit the city.

The GovLabPHL conference, Bridging Evidence and Policy in Philadelphia, was a daylong event hosted by Penns Fels Institute of Government and sponsored by the City of Philadelphia and the School of Arts and Sciences.

The conference, held at Perry World House sprang out of the Philadelphia Behavioral Science Initiative (PBSI), which was established in 2016 as a partnership between academics and the City of Philadelphia. The focus is on strengthening the citys external research partnerships and its ability to apply behavioral science in local government. In 2017, Mayor Jim Kenney supported the creation of GovLabPHL, led by the Mayors Policy Office, to expand the citys commitment to evaluation and practical use of data. Its led by Anjali Chainani, Kenneys director of policy, and co-founded by Daniel Hopkins, a professor in the Political Science Department in Penns School of Arts and Sciences.

Too often, researchers and policymakers can work on the same problem but in very different silos, and the practical knowledge about what actually works in policymaking doesn't make it back to university-based researchers. Through the Philadelphia Behavioral Science Initiative, we've been building a bridge between academic researchers and policymakers to close those gaps, Hopkins said. We were able to invite in something of a dream team of academic researchers doing actionable, policy-relevant research. I think many attendees left inspired to try new ideas and to deepen these ties between Penn, other local colleges and universities, and the City."

PBSI and GovLabPHL are working towards sustaining culture change within local government where we think about evaluation at the onset of a program of policy. We owe it the residents of our city to demonstrate how their taxpayer dollars are working and how we are using data to make continuous improvements. This annual conference creates a learning opportunity for city employees to bring common municipal challenges and hear from leading researchers about what has proven to work in other contexts, Chainani said.

Mariele McGlazer, the citys GovLabPHL manager and a student in the Fels Executive masters of public administration program, moderated the days event.

This was our fourth annual conference, and we were delighted to have another opportunity to invite academics and city workers to share ideas on how to tackle some of our toughest challenges and bring to the mayors policy priorities into reality, McGlazer said.

During his first term as mayor, Kenney enacted a tax on sweetened beverages that he saw as a way to help lift citizens out of poverty by improving early childhood education and rebuilding and renovating recreation centers, parks, and libraries.

Because of the tax, more than 6,000 3- and 4-year-olds gained access to pre-K, and 17 new schools serving 9,500 students were created, Kenney said.

The city also initiated work at 60 parks, recreation centers, playgrounds, and libraries through the Rebuild program. Philadelphia schools were also returned to local control and more than $1.2 billion in new money was invested by the city schools, Kenney told the attendees.

Still, the city has a lot of work to do fighting poverty, opioid addiction, and gun violence and continuing to improve public schools, and those will be the focus of his current and final term, he said.

Philadelphia is the poorest big city in the nation and had 356 homicides in 2019, up from 353 the year before, according to Philadelphia Police Department data.

Even my mother says to me, you should smile more. But when Im dealing with the things were dealing with, the poverty and addiction and violence, its hard to be happy, Kenney told the crowd at the start of the conference. But then I come into a room like this and I see all these dedicated public servants and others who are interested in government and public service here to help. Im smart but Im certainly not the smartest person in this room and that makes me feel good, that there are a lot smarter people in this room who really want to make our city the best it can be. Im really grateful to you and grateful to your commitment to making this work and hope that together well get there.

Among the speakers was Sendhil Mullainathan, the Roman Family University Professor of Computation and Behavioral Science at the University of Chicagos Booth School of Business. His current research uses machine learning to understand complex problems in human behavior, social policy, and especially medicine; Sara Goldrick-Rab, professor of higher education policy and sociology at Temple University, best known for her research on food and housing insecurity in higher education; and Jamila Michener, an assistant professor in the Department of Government at Cornell University who studies American politics with a focus on the political causes and consequences of poverty and racial inequality.

Philadelphia has long had a high poverty rate, and we certainly cant outspend cities like New York or San Francisco. But we can still compete. The way we can do so is partly by making use of the resources at our great universities here. Places like Penn and Temple, Swarthmore and Villanova, St. Joes and so many other local colleges and universities, Hopkins said. These universities are full of researchers who want to know what works, who want to know which of their ideas can actually translate into practice. We want to improve the city that we call home. Through this sustained partnership, Mayor Kenney is giving us that opportunity and we are deeply grateful.

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Philadelphia looks to evidence-based insights to inform policy - Penn: Office of University Communications

Human Behavior

Brazils First Indigenous Congresswoman Wants Her Government to Save the Amazon – NowThis

Jonia Wapixana is a lawyer, Brazils first Indigenous congresswoman, and president of the National Commission for the Defense of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Wapixana started her term in February 2019. She has vowed to fight for Brazils Indigenous people and their land, which President Jair Bolsonaro has threatened with economic and commercial development plans.

More than 900,000 Indigenous people live in Brazilabout 98% of their land lies within the Amazon, where they continually protect and preserve the land.

Deforestation in the Amazon surged 30% between August 2018 and July 2019, and 2019 saw an 80% increase in fires in Brazil more than half of which were in the Amazon. Experts attribute the widespread burning to weakened protections under Bolsonaro and illegal deforestation.

Wapixana spoke with NowThis about her new role, why shes motivated to protect Indigenouslands, and what more people should know about her culture and community. This is an edited and condensed version of the conversation.

NowThis: What does it mean for you and your community that you are the first Indigenous lawyer?Wapixana: Indigenous people need one voice in [the] National Congress. I [became] a lawyer to defend the Indigenous rights, especially in landsto protect the life, to protect the biodiversity, to protect the autonomy for Indigenous peoples.

NowThis: Tell us about the Wapixana people and their culture.Wapixana: Wapixana people are [a population of] seven thousand in all Brazil. The Indigenous have a lot of traditional knowledge, and live very close to rivers and have a small village. And the Indigenous Wapixana live together with others.

NowThis: Can you tell us about your role and what you're serving?Wapixana: I was elected by the Indigenous community because my people, especially Indigenous assembly, decided to improve the policies and improve the law to protect Indigenous rights. So my first challenge is to put this idea in policy to National Congress, improve the law to protect the Indigenous rights, [and help] the Amazon [become] more sustainable for my country.

NowThis: Why is the Amazon rainforest important to indigenous people?Wapixana: The Amazon is my home is my life. Not just for me, for my quality of rights and my quality of lands. Amazon means the everything. Its the reason for Indigenous peoples whohave traditional knowledge and understand the forest to become us and the forest tobecome the life is essential for the planet to protect the Amazon to continue the life in theplanet.

NowThis: What is at stake for the indigenous people in Brazil if the Amazon is destroyed?Wapixana: The Amazon is at risk now. It is a responsibility not just for Indigenous people, but for everybody who wants to survive on the planet. We need to respect the forest, respect the biodiversity, respect the Amazon. We need to take care of this you need to become more responsible, and take care to protect the Amazon like Indigenous peoples. You need to understand, you need to become more sensible and make some compromises to change it. More bad human behavior will have to change. If not, the Amazon will disappear. And it is a consequence not just for those who live in the Amazon, but for our planet.

NowThis: What is the most important thing people around the world need to know what's going on between the Indigenous people and President Jair Bolsonaro's government?Wapixana: President Bolsonaro hates Indigenous peoples. In his first speech, Bolsonaro said, No more Indigenous land for Indigenous people. He doesn't recognize Indigenous rights. It puts the national Constitution at risk. So for this reason, the Indigenous people are more vulnerable in Bolsonaro's government.

So the first thing that people [should] understand is that Brazil and Indigenous people are at risk. [T]he indigenous and the government [can] work to improve the law and policy and give more protection.

NowThis: Why do you think it's important for indigenous people to keep their land?Wapixana: Because the land means life for everybody. We try to teach [the] next generation to take care of the forests, the biodiversity, the water, the kinds of values you need to show for planets. You need to calibrate the behavior; you need to teach but live according to nature. So it is very important not just for Indigenous [people], but for everybody who lives here.

NowThis: How have you stood up against President Bolsanaro to protect your land and your people?Wapixana: I am in [National Congress]. So I try to write good law. And try to monitor President Bolsonaro. We try to ask themthe governmentto do the action, the policy according to our national Constitution. Now, I try to improve the law to protect more Indigenous land. Try to create one front. This front, becomes stronger to try to call different parameters to face and try to show what's the matter. [He] needs to change this behavior and change the conception about Indigenous rights because Indigenous rights are in [protected in] the national Constitution.

President Bolsonaro must respect the national Constitution. That's number one. If he respects the national Constitution theyd try to to invest in some national program to protect Indigenous land, to open this responsibility, not just for Brazil, but for everybody in the world. They have to give the rights for Indigenous [people] and stop the violence against Indigenous people.

Learn more about Waxipana here.

PRODUCERSRex SakamotoJasmine AmjadKimberly J. Avalos

CAMERARex Sakamoto

VIDEO EDITORKimberly J. Avalos

PRODUCTION MANAGERKelsey Marsh

SENIOR PRODUCERRhon G. Flatts

EDITORSarah Frank

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Brazils First Indigenous Congresswoman Wants Her Government to Save the Amazon - NowThis

Human Behavior

‘Heartbreaking and compelling’: North Dakota man digs deep in podcast based on gruesome, small-town crime – The Dickinson Press

Its not a now-and-then pursuit, but one thats woven into the fabric of his life.

In the case of a 1976 North Dakota kidnapping, bank heist and double-homicide, it wasnt that the crime was unsolved or that the perpetrators weren't punished.

What bothered Wolner was that stories of the victims lives seemed mostly untold.

I think I saw that as an injustice, and it just went from there. Like, OK... Ill do it then, he said.

The crime that rocked the tiny south-central North Dakota town of Zeeland is the most recent case Wolner researched on his own and turned into a true-crime podcast.

I start going down a path thats kind of like an itch and I scratch it a little bit, he said.

Wolner, 55, creator of Dakota Spotlight Podcast, recently released the seven-episode podcast documentary, produced at his home in Hebron.

The California native learned of the horrific crime by reading an old newspaper article.

A husband and wife in their 60s were shot dead in their pajamas after being forced to get money from a nearby bank.

Wade and Ellen Zick were kidnapped and murdered in Zeeland, N.D. in 1976.

Wolner said if In Cold Blood author Truman Capote had read the article about the Zeeland crime instead of one about a quadruple murder in rural Kansas on which the book is based, Capote might have written about it.

Hes not comparing himself to the famed writer, but rather, seeing parallels between the crimes.

This story itself is as heartbreaking and compelling, Wolner said, his voice stifled by emotion.

James Wolner, true crime podcast creator from Hebron, N.D. Special to The Forum

Wolner was raised in the city of Healdsburg, located in Sonoma County in the heart of Californias wine country.

He remembers feeling deep curiosity and empathy at a young age, qualities that would serve him well later.

Two weeks after graduating college with a degree in English Literature, Wolner moved to Sweden with an exchange student from there, whom hed met while vacationing in Yosemite National Park.

That relationship didnt pan out, but he stayed in Sweden for more than 20 years, during which time he married, had two daughters and divorced.

He moved back to the U.S. in 2013, to Boulder, Colo., where he found himself drawn less to the mountains and more to the flats.

Previously, Wolners only connection to the Midwest was that his parents had grown up in a small farming community in eastern South Dakota.

He considered moving there, but instead took a web developer position in Hebron.

Its where he still lives, despite having since taken a computer programmer job an hours drive away in Mandan.

During virtually all of his free time, he pores over the podcast work in a small home office, sometimes spending a half hour perfecting a 30-second segment.

No woman in the world would put up with this. Thats why Im single, Wolner said, with a laugh.

The podcast documentary delves into the pre-dawn crime that occurred in Zeeland on July 11, 1976.

Wade Zick, 66, and his wife Ellen, 65, were taken from their home by armed men who forced them to go to a bank in Zeeland, where Zick was the manager.

After getting money from the bank, the couple were driven to a gravel pit a few miles out of town and shot dead.

Three young men, all with ties to the community, were later arrested, convicted and sentenced.

More than 40 years later, Wolner began looking into the details of the crime and those involved even the most obscure ones that help add context and character to the podcast.

For example, he researched the weather on a particular date in Prosser, Wash., because two of the perpetrators parents got married there that day.

Thats not normal to be that detailed. But its like I want to be there myself, he said.

James Wolner, true crime podcast creator from Hebron, N.D. Special to The Forum

Wolner has since interviewed and come to know many of the victims family members. Early on, they must have wondered about the approach, he said. But after meeting with them, they were on board.

Its been an honor, he said, pausing to collect his emotions.

Most of his listeners have come from this region and the snowbird areas of Arizona and Florida, he said,

Hes already planning another possible podcast about the 1993 disappearance of two people from Wishek, N.D.

Its satisfying, he said, to be involved in something that has meaning.

Its my way of making an attempt to understand, I guess, human behavior, and to connect the dots between things, Wolner said.

Learn more about this podcast, and Wolner, on the Dakota Spotlight website.

Episode 7 - Crossing the Street

Episode 6 - Flip a Coin

Episode 5 - Caramel Rolls

Episode 4 - 'Pink Slip'

Episode 3 - 'Z is for Zick'

Episode 2 - No Banker Tomorrow

Episode 1 - A Deed Without a Name

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'Heartbreaking and compelling': North Dakota man digs deep in podcast based on gruesome, small-town crime - The Dickinson Press

Human Behavior

Could Statistical Analysis Predict Who Will Win the Next ‘CT Event? – Surfer Magazine

Each year since 2003, thousands of Fantasy Surfer players attempt to predict the success of World Tour competitors at each WCT event. Those with the best strategies (or perhaps a really lucky Magic 8 ball) accumulate enough points by seasons end to be crowned Fantasy Surfer Champion. Past FS victors have been software gurus (Kevin Priester), ex racecar drivers (Luca Fioravanti), former top-tier professional surfers (Shea Lopez), and several industry insiders.

Dan Waltersthis years winner who outsmarted 13,600 other Fantasy Surfer playersused analytics, statistics and a keen eye for whos surfing well and whos not to climb his way to the top of the 2019 rankings. Walters, who works as a professor in behavioral sciences, used predictive data to choose winning teams and accumulate the most points by year-end. We recently caught up with Walters for a quick back-and-forth regarding his Fantasy Surfer success.

How long have you been playing Fantasy Surfer?Ive been playing Fantasy Surfer for 7 years. My strategy centers around weighing the factors that are most predictive of surfer success at each venue.

What do you do for a living?Something that might tend towards analytics?Im a professor of behavioral sciences so I spend a lot of my time trying to predict human behavior using modeling and statistical analysis. I attempted to bring the same level of rigor to my Fantasy Surfer predictions. In 2014, I downloaded all of the data on competitors performances from the World Surf League and archived ASPs websites. From this data, I constructed a predictive model that incorporated a long list of variables, including surf conditions, current ranking, fixed effects for individual competitors, current cost on Fantasy Surfer and a number of other elements. Modeling these variables with all of the past data helped to determine which were the most important at which locations and for which surfers. I wont give away all of my secrets, but you might be surprised that some variables where very predictive while others were not.

So what would be a good example of what youve used this data to predict?For instance, results in the past two contests are very good predictors of future performance, even after controlling for current rank and performance in past years. This model served me well and I consistently performed at the top of my league. However, in the last year, I made a change in how I utilized the model that may have allowed me to clinch the big win.=

What did you do differently?Rather than following the model religiously, I also incorporated my own competitive strategy. For instance, I would take the top recommendations of the model and then think about how other Fantasy Surfer players might choose. If the model recommended two surfers, one that I felt would be chosen by most FS players, and one that would be a low-percentage choice, then I would be more likely to choose the low-percentage surfer. Thus, my team choice was data-driven, but also incorporated a strategy of contrarian decision making.

Thats some heavy planning for Fantasy Surfer!These strategies helped me be successful, but of course, I was also very lucky. Losing one more heat would have cost me the championship. Also, truth be told, I forgot to set my team for Pipe (I spent about 5 minutes setting a preliminary team) but still did very well in the contest.

You incorporate a lot of history and data regarding results, do you also follow all the surfers on Twitter and Instagram to stay on top of their injuries, travels, etc.?

I dont tend to follow surfers on social media. I find that its mostly noise and hard to gather any useful information.If a surfer is injured I might check social media to gauge their recovery progress. I might also look through clips of rookies to assess how they could perform at a given location or in specific conditions.

Thanks for your time, Dan!

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Could Statistical Analysis Predict Who Will Win the Next 'CT Event? - Surfer Magazine

Human Behavior

Speed date for a mentor with the Women of Toledo organization – WTOL

TOLEDO, Ohio Life is full of endless possibilities, but one thing is for certain; change is inevitable.

And while there are some people who have mastered to embrace change, others may need help grasping it.

That's why the Women of Toledo organization kicked off their monthly Mentors of (M.O.M.) event, where the two types of people can meet and learn from each other.

"We try to make safe spaces and platforms for women through all walks of life to have the ability to meet somebody that maybe they can find as a mentor," said Sierra Ortiz, with the Women of Toledo."And maybe you don't know exactly what you're looking for, you just know you're up for a change, you're up for empowerment, you're up for educating. This is safe place to do all of that."

M.O.M. happens every fourth Thursday of the month and is designed like a speed dating event with tables set for two. But instead of seeking romance, women are seeking mentor-mentee relationships.

"A mentee-mentor relationship is critical to any type of success life," said Angela Lucas, an executive life coach and mentor.

In just 90 minutes, over 120 connections are made at these M.O.M. events. There's always at least 12 different mentors and 10 mentees networking for five minutes each. The ultimate goal is for mentees to connect with as many mentors as they can, and then hopefully grow a relationship that goes beyond the M.O.M. event.

"This process helps expedites how you can create mentors throughout your professional and personal growth," said Nina Corder, the managing director for Women of Toledo. "It's really like dating, you got to 'date' for awhile and then build that relationship. We are human beings and it's natural for human behavior to build that connection, that relationship. "

Those who attend the event will find women of all ages filling in both roles as mentor and mentees.

"We are very inter-generational. We don't just believe mentors, up and down, we also do down and up. Some of our baby boomer mentees enjoy meeting a mentor who is a millennial because you got to learn about the new generations and technology. And of course we respect our legacy group. They have knowledge and wisdom they can offer to a lot of our mentees," said Corder.

Anyone planning to attend a M.O.M. event, must register herefirst and create a mentee profile and are encouraged to bring business cards, ideas and course an open mind.

"Be ready to find something you weren't looking for. Be ready to meet someone that you wouldn't expect to have such an influence on you but were here to help provide," said Ortiz.

You can get an idea of the mentors you may be able to meet by viewing the full list here.

Pamala, a recent graduate, attended the event as a mentee, but is already offering advice to women still not sure about going:

"Take a chance. Everything is very comfortable. You don't feel like anyone is judging you. You know that they're going to give you the information you need, that you're seeking because there's such a variety."

Below is a list of the remaining M.O.M. events of the year:

Locations are yet to be determined.

RELATED: Toledo activist group calls for change on Dr. Martin Luther King Day

RELATED: 'We help boys become men' - Annual 'Tie Event' is more than just learning how to tie a tie

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Speed date for a mentor with the Women of Toledo organization - WTOL

Human Behavior

Jamia students foiled plans of gunman Gopal and his masters – National Herald

It is frustrating when peaceful protesters remain peaceful even in the face of a bullet. Such Gandhian restraint upsets many plans and possibilities.

The moment Rambhakt Gopal fired a pistol at them on Thursday afternoon the student marchers of Jamia Millia Islamia ought to have panicked and erupted in retaliatory anger. The hot-headed amongst them ought to have picked up roadside rubble and hurled rocks and stones at the police. The rest should have immediately run helter-skelter.

It would have provided the media with visual evidence of violence. The men in uniform, in turn, would have got the opportunity they were waiting for to retaliate - a lathi charge to start with, followed by tear-gas shells, water cannons and even a Dyer-like fusillade if need be.

The faint-hearted among the protesters should have shrieked and screamed in fear. There should have been a stampede, with everyone pushing, shoving and trampling on each other in a desperate bid to get away from the scene as fast as possible. It would have added to the chaos and confusion.

Instead, what did they do?

They kept their cool and remained peaceful. Some even started holding hands to give solace and strength to each other and formed a human chain. Others rushed to the aid of the young student with a bullet injury on his hand, helped him get over the yellow barricades and escorted him to the nearest hospital.

This is not the way it should have panned out. When someone fires a gun at you, the reflex reaction is to either run away or fight back. Not to do either of these two things is contrary to all theories of human behavior under sudden stress or unforeseen provocation.

When a gun is fired at you, when one of you actually stops a bullet, the reaction is supposed to be predictable and reflexive fear or rage. Thats what the Pavlov Theory is all about - a sudden stimulus invariably triggers a conditioned response.

It is irritating when young people disregard such proven principles of human behavior. It is all the more annoying in the present instance because the atmosphere was so right, the air is so thick with hatred, the setting was so carefully choreographed, the time would have been so perfect.

After all, what better day could there have been for violence to erupt on the streets of Delhi than on the anniversary of Mahatma Gandhis assassination?

The police would have been deemed to be entirely justified in cracking down immediately. The entire blame could have shifted squarely to the desh-drohis and tukde-tukde gang.

Dozens of TV camera crews were present right there on the spot to click videos of the mayhem happening right in front of them. The visuals would have gone viral.

The video evidence would have been there for the world to see especially in Brussels where Members of the European Parliament would hopefully refrain from trying to pass strongly-worded resolutions denouncing the Indian government for divisive laws and brutal suppression of human rights.

Should the police stand idly by when thousands of protesters indulge in violence (as the videos would have shown)? Should the men in uniform be sitting ducks when lethal rocks are hurled at them?

Alas, none of this happened. The Jamia students did not throw stones. They did not lose their heads. There was no stampede. It is all so anti-climatic and disappointing.

Television screens are only showing Rambhakt Gopal firing at the students, again and again and again.

They are also needlessly showing police officers standing in the background, doing nothing to accost the black-jacketed fanatic throughout the time he was moving freely, leveling a pistol at the students in classic gun-fighter stance and shouting Yeh Lo Azadi, Jai Shri Ram slogans.

They are irresponsibly showing clips of one or two senior officers standing with arms crossed across their chests in classic do-nothing posture. They are unfairly commenting on the gentle, arm-over-shoulders manner in which the gunman was belatedly taken into custody - after he had pulled the trigger and hit one of the students.

Apart from being terribly unpatriotic television showing the police in bad light and depicting the students as models of Gandhian non-violence it also puts paid to many other possibilities.

What an opportunity lost!

A convincing crackdown and few broken Jamia bones would surely have had a chilling effect on other anti-CAA-NRC protests that have become such a headache for the government.

In particular it would have punctured the confidence of the amazing ladies of Shaheen Bagh who began their sit-in 46 days ago on December 15 and have become the stuff of legends.

Alas, Gunman Gopals Facebook boast of Shaheen Bagh Game Over! remains unfulfilled.

Another possibility that remains unrequited is that if the Jamia peace march had erupted in violence, it could have paved the way for cancelling the ongoing Assembly polls on grounds of collapse of law and order. So important to prevent yet another embarrassing election defeat in yet another state.

But, alas, the day of the Mahatmas death anniversary passed off infuriatingly peacefully.

Now, in all probability, voting will take place on February 8 as scheduled unless some other Rambhakt suddenly surfaces in the next few days and is able to fan the fire of violence more efficiently and with greater success than Gunman Gopal.

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Jamia students foiled plans of gunman Gopal and his masters - National Herald

Human Behavior

IAHSS to Hold 2020 Annual Conference in Arizona – Campus Safety Magazine

IAHSS annual event will take place May 4-6 in Phoenix, Arizona.

The IAHSS 52nd Annual Conference and Exhibition will take place this year in Phoenix, Arizona, May 4-6 at the Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass.

The International Association for Healthcare Security and Safety (IAHSS) announces that its 52nd Annual Conference and Exhibition will take place this year in Phoenix, Arizona, May 4-6.

The show will feature a wide range of educational sessions, speakers and networking events.

Kicking off the first day will be Craig Valentine, the Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking. He will cover the top tools you need to keep your audiences on the edge of their seats and influence them to take action. Whether communicating with an audience of one or 1,000, you will pick up tools to motivate, inspire and confidently deliver your message in a memorable way.

Valentine is the co-author of the Amazon.com No. 1 Bestseller, World Class Speaking in Action. He is also the former three-time Salesperson of the Year for Glencoe/McGraw-Hills Mid-Atlantic Division after reaching up to 233% of his goal. Hes the former Executive Director of an Employment Academy for homeless men in Baltimore City, which had a 100% job placement rate under his tenure.

On the second day, Dr. William J. Lewinski, Ph.D. will deliver the keynote covering strategies and techniques to improve your ability to work with persons in distress by establishing control, enhancing skills to establish contact build rapport and gain influence to achieve a successful outcome. In addition, this session addresses the rhetoric prevalent in todays emotionally charged atmosphere and unbiasedly focuses on the proven scientific realities surrounding human behavior as they apply to efforts to de-escalate situations.

Dr. Lewinski is a leading behavioral scientist whose work has focused on the intensive study of human dynamics involved in high stress, life-threatening encounters. He has a Ph.D. in police psychology and is a professor emeritus of law enforcement at Minnesota State University, Mankato, where he taught for more than 28 years, was a law enforcement program director and also chair of the department of government. Dr. Lewinskis research has impacted law enforcement officers and agencies worldwide and has revolutionized the way force investigations and training are conducted.

Other speakers at the IAHSS Annual Conference and Exhibition will include:

Other topics that will be covered include workplace violence in healthcare, security training programs, behavioral health patients, retaining top performers, service animals, CPTED, body-worn cameras, contract and proprietary security, and more.

Additionally, the shows exhibit hall will feature the latest hospital security products and services, and the IAHSS Foundation Recognition Banquet will honor healthcare protection pros who have demonstrated exemplary service.

The conference will take place at the Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass.

For additional information and to register, visit IAHSS.org.

See you in Phoenix!

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IAHSS to Hold 2020 Annual Conference in Arizona - Campus Safety Magazine