All right. I'll get started then. My name is James Pfeffer. I'm the chair of the Vermont Cannabis Control Board. Today is June 6, 2022, and I call this meeting to order. So our main order of business today is to approve more licenses. And once again, these will be primarily to social equity applicants and women in my norio businesses. I know that it can be frustrating to hear this if you do not fall into one of these groups. But I do encourage everyone listening to keep in mind the journey it took to get us to this point and the highly destructive war on drugs, which preceded it, and still reverberates in our communities today. You know, popular refrain from the 80s and 90s was that cannabis is a gateway drug. When in actuality, what we saw is that convictions for cannabis-related offenses are gateway convictions into involvement with the criminal justice system. And once you're in, it's very difficult to get out. There's a negative feedback loop that happens when you have a criminal conviction on your record. You're disqualified from voting in federal elections. You're ineligible for any number of professional licenses. Employers and landlords look down on you. And, you know, good luck getting into college or getting any sort of financial assistance or bank loan. So all of a sudden, the only opportunities available are illegal enterprises. And this sort of negative spiral has replayed itself tens of thousands of times in Vermont alone. And it's also had intergenerational impacts on families and communities across the country. So here we are opening a new market. It's taken decades of advocacy to bring it into existence. And we feel that it's important to take a little bit of time at the outset to try and triage some of the harm and prioritize people and communities that were most severely harmed by this plan, which we've all now collectively realized we should have never criminalized in the first place. And it's not just the board that feels that this is important. The legislature wrote this priority system directly into our law. They asked us to prioritize and expedite applications from people from communities that have been disproportionately impacted by cannabis prohibition and from people who've been directly impacted. We would literally be in violation of the law if we ignored this directive. And it's not just the legislature that feels this is important. Governor Scott issued a statement when he let this law go into effect, stating that the bill, even with this priority system, did not do enough for the communities that were most negatively affected by cannabis enforcement. He urged the legislature to do more, including reducing fees and providing business and technical support. So just please, as you're awaiting your license approval, please keep in mind the broader context of this moment, the bipartisan directive to the board to embed equity into the foundation of our market and to know that we will work as quickly as we can to approve as many outdoor cultivator licenses this year so that you can participate in this growing season. And just a quick reminder, other than integrated licenses, we do not have a cap on the number of licenses we can issue, like there are in other states. And we've heard some confusion about this point from applicants. There are certain people that we cannot issue licenses to.  But really, we designed our pre-qualification process to hopefully identify these people early before they made any sort of significant capital expenditures. But if you're not disqualified because of one of these events, and you can meet the minimum standards that our rules require, the board will give you a license. However, one of these minimum standards relates to your current behavior. There's a difference between someone who has been historically impacted by the war on drugs and someone who's currently flagrantly violating the law and our rules with respect to growing, selling, and advertising. Sorry, I lost my spot here. That's a good point to last second. One of our priorities is to shift the legacy market into the regulated market, but we cannot look the other way on these types of issues. We're jeopardizing the entire industry in Vermont. If we ignore the FinCEN guidance and grant licenses to people who are openly violating state and federal law, we're issuing licenses at a good rate. We're about to add more staff. There is a backlog right now, but that backlog is not going to last forever. However, if you intentionally violate the law while you're waiting for your application to be reviewed, that could impact, and that could have a long-term implication on your ability to get licensed. One of our other minimum licensing standards is getting all of your necessary permits from Fire Safety. I know a lot of the same people tune in every week and I'm a broken record on this point, but we keep getting questions about whether we can waive those requirements and we can't. If your place of business is operating in a public building, you need a certificate of occupancy before we can grant you a license. If you're not operating in a public building, we need a letter from Fire Safety certifying that your location is not a public building. Complying with the building codes is a barrier to entering this market. We know that, but the codes are not arbitrary. They're there to protect you, your neighbors, your employees, first responders, our inspectors, and anyone else that might be entering your space. Landon Wheeler is your point of contact at the Division of Fire Safety. Once again, his email is landon.wheeler at vermont.gov. His cell phone number is<PHONE_NUMBER>. He attended our meeting last week and walked us through the basic process for getting your certification. That video is up on our YouTube page at Vermont CCB and encourage everyone to just rewatch that video. But here's some of the high-level points he made. He can conduct that threshold inquiry about whether your building is a public building or not relatively quickly. And I think from what I understand without a site visit, if you are a public building, you need to apply for a permit, which you can do on the Division of Fire Safety's website, which is firesafety.vermont.gov. Fire Safety has a very good clearance rate. He said that he gets through roughly 95% of their applications within 30 days of them being filed. But he did caution that fire safety did not get any additional staff in the cannabis bill. There's a huge number of new projects this year related to cannabis and otherwise, so you should engage early. And just to be clear, the CCB will not grant you a license until we see one of three documents. Certification that your operation is not in a public building, a certificate of occupancy, or a certificate of conditional occupancy. In other news, S188 did get signed by the governor. It's now Act 158. It's a miscellaneous bill, meaning that it makes 30 or so changes to the cannabis laws. Most of them are technical and non-substantive. And instead of having Bryn walk us through the bill here, I think we're just going to post a summary to our website. And then last thing, just a reminder that starting next week, our regular board meetings will be shifting to Wednesdays at 1 p.m., so there's no meeting this coming Monday. And other than that, we just have to approve the minutes from our last meeting on May 31st. Is there a motion to move? Seconded. All in favor? Aye. Okay. I think Bryn, this is the part where I turn things over to you. Great. So I'm going to start out, as I always do, with our pre-qualification applications. Here are the numbers as of last Friday. You can see we have 365 that are submitted, but incomplete. Since our pre-qual window closed on May 31st, that number should not grow for the foreseeable future. So today we have 20 before the board that our staff are recommending for pre-qualification. Six of them are cultivators, five are manufacturers, two are wholesalers, and five are retail. I think those numbers might be a little bit off, but let's go through them and find out. So each of the applicants have demonstrated compliance with board rule 1.4.1 and 1.4.2 and have demonstrated themselves to be suitable for pre-qualification.  So we will correct those numbers at the top of the page at the end of the meeting before we post this to our website. I can move on now to talk about our full license applications unless we want to talk about any concerns about these pre-qual applicants now. I think there was a business name that I had a concern about that was in the pre-qual and I think there's also one in the licensing both pre-qual. So there were two names that I was that I mean they gave me pause you know that I think maybe we should have a discussion about them. Fantasia Farms and Sugar Shack was a two that as I was scrolling through the list of pre-qual names that just came in a little bit pause. Yeah and so is the concern that they might be appealing to youth? Yes, yes, but I and I say this and that they gave me pause as I was scrolling through but I'm sort of on the fence about both of them whether or not that's really I mean the word Fantasia existed before Disney made a movie right it has a whole other meaning and then you know I don't know about sugar it's not quite like candy it's not quite as blatant but they both gave me pause and I want to know what you both thought about that. I feel like in a jurisdiction that wasn't Vermont or in this part of the country Sugar Shack would raise more eyebrows than the way that we typically think of it you know with respect to sugar season and everything going on in on the early part of the year. Yeah I mean it does have kind of significance in Vermont that it might not otherwise the Kyle's point so I think I I could be alright with that one but I also do think that how they use it might change if they have a lot of candy around it on their advertising you know that impact it so on both of those I feel like these are both for pre-qualification. I believe so just double check that. I know Sugar Shack. Oh there we go so one is up for full license and that's Fantasia Farm. And did they get pre-qualified you know under Fantasia Farm? I do not believe so but we can double check that. Sugar Shack uh Sugar Shack a cultivator or a manufacturer do we know? I'm sorry I don't mean to go down. I'm sure we know somewhere. I mean I think to your point Pepper it doesn't matter how they're used so maybe the guidance to the applicants is these names are okay but be mindful of these other things. Right I mean we're going to have a sense of how they're going to use them during that kind of packaging process in the advertising process so I do feel like notifying them like we have other applicants that this might implicate your ability to use this business name on your packaging is the probably best way to go. So Fantasia Farms has not been pre-qualified and the Sugar Shack is up for a mixed use cultivation license pre-qual. Can we send a similar directive letter just indicating that they're at the appropriate time when we are reviewing your labeling your packaging etc. The use of this name might come might be implicated. Yep yeah they're cool and clever names I totally get what folks are going for but I think they all just need to be on the same page with respect to how certain folks in the Vermont community could interpret business names like this and what it signals so we just need to be careful and maybe a little once we find some bandwidth we can put out guidance around how you can use your name you know. I think that we've kind of covered that a little bit in the labeling guidance right so yes. Gotta communicate it in many different ways. That's right you are correct you know learn the way that they learn. Good thank you. So I'll move on now to the full license application numbers. So we have eight up for review today for the board. One is a testing lab our first testing lab up for a license and the rest are cultivation licenses five of them are outdoor and two are indoor. It's impressive in and of itself just I think if we approve all of these that brings our number up to 19. That's right. And you know I know I mentioned in the past but Massachusetts was averaging four to six a month early on so. You can keep bringing that. So the following are staff recommendations for cannabis establishment license. So as with every week these are the applicants that have demonstrated compliance with all of the requirements for cannabis establishment license that set out both in our rules and in statute. So we'll go through them now. First is Cloverhill cannabis. Staff is recommending approval for an indoor tier one cultivation license for this business and economic empowerment business. Fantasia Farm outdoor tier one cultivator. Again economic empowerment applicant. Third is DBA off-piste farm seeking outdoor tier one cultivation. Fourth is doing businesses Kodiak's treasure outdoor tier one cultivation license. Fifth is Shindig and G's craft cannabis outdoor tier one cultivation. Sixth is Duke's diesel indoor tier one cultivation. Seventh is Birdlands LLC outdoor tier one cultivator. And lastly is BIA diagnostics. So each of these eight applicants has met the criteria for licensure according to staff and we are recommending them for a license. And before we finish I can we do have one social equity status approval for the board to review. Here are social equity license application numbers a total of 37 as of Friday. So we have one up for approval and it's seeking a testing lab license. Submission number 144 and staff are recommending social equity status be granted for this applicant since they meet the criteria for a socially disadvantaged business applicant as defined in board rule. And we have I believe three recommendations for denial. Submission 735, submission 59 and submission 490 and staff is recommending social equity status denial for these three applicants and say each of them don't meet the criteria for a social equity individual applicant as defined in board rule. Is there a motion to approve the staff recommendation? The board accept each of the recommendations for pre-qualification social equity status and licensing approval included in this meeting presented by staff. I'll second. Any discussion? All right. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Great job. Really impressive work and glad to see the kind of focus on social equity, economic empowerment and outdoor cultivators. People are anxious to get going. So last on our agenda is to open the floor to public comment. We'll handle it the same way we always do which is if you join via the link please just raise your virtual hand and we'll try and call on you in the order that you've raised your hand and then we'll move to people that joined by the phone. First we have Dolan Dolan. Can you hear me? Yeah. Oh great. Thanks so much. My name is Jessie Lynn Dolan. I'm a nurse. I specialize in opioid use disorder as well as cannabis plant medicine. Appreciate you guys taking the time to listen to us. I do have just a couple comments. I have not been very available for a while because of work to chime in and to listen to a lot of these sessions unfortunately but been trying to catch up. That also is partly because of some of the frustration and I guess disappointment regarding the medical program and dispensaries here and I just want to just go quickly back to that. As we know at this point we still have no mandated testing for any contaminants or in-house THC testing is the only thing that is mandated. There's no education in-house and we have not had any updates this legislative session or even the medical bill that even got a drop of attention unfortunately and we have one of the most restrictive cannabis programs in the United States. So I just wanted to quickly circle us back to that because that is so important. And what I want to mention is the fact that we now have a hemp program which has higher standards than our adult use program and a medical program which has lower standards than both of those programs combined. So in my mind that's a little bit backwards from what we would want and I would think the ultimate goal is here. So with that in mind I want to mention a few things that the medical program versus the hemp program versus the adult use program is differing in that we maybe need to look at having a little more uniformity not only for consumer protection and efficacy and financial reasons but a lot of other reasons we could go into. It won't take the time to do that. One of my most concerning ones is how we distinguish and label our products. I haven't heard any conversation amongst the cannabis control bar relating to that. What I would ask is that we're looking at the hemp labeling laws and how they've done a great job distinguishing distillates versus whole plants. Again correct me if I'm wrong I have had zero I've heard zero conversations regarding these labeling laws from the adult use program here. You know what I really want to impress upon you guys and unfortunately legislators who are not willing to listen but they are willing to listen to some of the anti cannabis rhetoric and doctors that we have is that there's a huge difference between distillate and whole plant and with the THC caps that are not in place basically what we are doing is increasing intoxication by flooding our endocannabinoid system receptors and increasing our risk of cannabis hyperemesis syndrome. So if we don't if we have a legislator who doesn't understand the science and are listening to jargon instead of listening to the people that can actually give them the correct information well then I feel the cannabis control board's job is going to be unfortunately to supersede that with actually proper labeling laws to help our consumers. So if we're not labeling a product that is a distillate versus a whole spectrum that is a very different effect that has on somebody when we're talking and thinking about consumer safety and regardless of consumer safety also financial you know concerns and efficacy when purchasing those products. So I really am asking you guys where are we at with the labeling laws are you going to be matching at least the hemp laws distinguishing that distillate versus whole plant and at what point you know we're kind of in an interim period here you guys now own the medical program but we don't even have a committee that we used to have for symptom relief oversight so that patients are having a voice it's kind of all stalled and I completely understand you guys are inundated have a lot of work but I don't feel during that time medical should absolutely get the last conversation and not you know be considered and not unfortunately moving forward I'll reiterate to anyone that's listening at this point our medical dispensary still have no mandated testing for contaminants yet we have that in adult use that is the absolute opposite of what we want to seek for consumer safety. So we need to encourage education through our labeling through education programs and unfortunately we're just not seeing that. I do hope we see that sooner than later. Again this is on legislators more than the cannabis control board but it does come to you guys to be able to you know have the ability to hopefully fix some of these labeling laws fix some of this education really dive in a little bit stronger into you know where are we at with the medical patient financial fund right now. No one's talked about that it's been six months since that has been you know unfortunately I think kind of left in the back burner based on putting prioritizing adult use. In my mind the legislators and some medical dispensaries have a fixed agenda. I don't believe you guys do and I appreciate that but you know if we really want to focus on safety and transparency if we're not labeling appropriately we are straight up lying we're showing that education does not matter. And on that last thing I want to say is speaking of labeling you guys are really working hard and doing a great job trying to have a diverse and inclusive program. When we label breastfeeding that is antiquated and that is not inclusive. Perfect example I'm publishing research right now from the University of Vermont on cannabis and human milk feeding. We published the same study six years ago it was called marijuana and breastfeeding. Those six years UBM has recognized it's more important to now call it cannabis and human milk feeding. So I'm hoping you guys will readdress this before labels start being printed to actually be inclusive. Every Wednesday at 10 a.m. I meet with a parent who is a female biological but please do not call them a female or a mom call them a dad and say they chest fed they do not want to be called a mom or said that they have breastfed. So I'm asking you guys for inclusion you know with our labeling laws not only for education regarding that consumer safety that transparency when we're looking at distillate versus isolate versus whole plant products but also for our parenting out there to really look at having some language that is a little more up to date in 2022 and not having language that is so antiquated as far as breastfeeding. So I think that's everything I wanted to say. My real hope I guess guys is that next year there's going to be a huge push to work on medical because it has been you know a bit a bit frustrating to watch this process and watch all this work and time and effort done to the adult market which we absolutely need but you know patients are definitely being left on the way side whether that's legislatively you know their agenda and what they're bringing forward but just as a patient and a caregiver and a nurse educator want to kind of circle us all back to that and remember how important that is in connection with the adult use and lastly if you guys really are concerned about you know some of the rhetoric some of the doctors are speaking to as far as intoxication and cannabis hyperemesis syndrome the two things I will recommend is we should be moving forward looking at terpene testing is mandated along with cannabinoid testing because we know intoxication is not just from from the cannabinoids that is very clear the science dictates that very well and clear so if that's something we can look at you know that would also be appreciated so again thank you guys for your time I know I've just kind of thrown a lot at you but haven't been available for a while to speak and again just really want to circle us back to where this all started and that was with supporting patients and helping patients and we need to kind of somehow bring that back into prioritization if not now you know ASAP wants legislative session gets running and I hope you hope you guys will help us as patients and caregivers hit the floor of running with that so so thank you very much thanks Jesse Lynn okay organics hi this is Greta with okay organics I just wanted to touch on the I guess is the economic empowerment status of applications I see today that you approved a couple that were could classified as general or standard so I'm just wondering what happened to the rest of the social equity and or economic empowerment I was under the impression that women-owned businesses were in that economic empowerment category which I am and my application from what I can see has not moved from the submitted category which I submitted 46 days ago and it's number 24 so I'm just a little confused I guess at the order now that you've moved on to general and standard and it seems like some that we're supposed to have priority over that haven't even been looked at yet that's all thanks thanks for that red clover analytics yes hello I'm getting plenty yes right clover analytics once again I want to thank the board for all the efforts that they've been doing towards this program and I do want to repeat some of the things that Jesse Lynn just said always great to hear from her like I said a few weeks ago we haven't heard anything from the medical program we haven't heard any any movement from that side of things again we keep hearing from the recreational side of things but again one of my biggest concerns with opening up a testing lab was to you know provide that security for patients but nonetheless the other thing I wanted to touch on is the THC caps and with the THC caps a lot of things a big thing that I've been learning lately is that no concentrate if it's worth this money it's going to come out out of the plant below 60% and the reason I want to touch on that is because I've talked to a lot of perspective customers who are willing to give up their data to quantify those things for you guys so you can take in to the select board but nonetheless it's one of the things that I wanted to touch with you is the ability to be able to offer that data for you guys to present and use because again a lot of this product is going to come up above 60%. Thank you very much for your time. Thanks Yoram. So anyone else that joined via the link please raise your virtual hand if you'd like to make a public comment and then if you joined via the phone you can hit star six to unmute yourself. Well really appreciate everyone who joined all the public comments you know the medical program is always kind of on our minds and we do need to kind of think about the direction that we're going to go there. Certainly Jesse Lynn you've helped kind of clarify some of the issues that need to be addressed. So thank you all for joining. Thanks to the public comments. Thank you to our staff for just plugging away at these applications and just sort of final reminder that our next meeting is next Wednesday at 1 pm not Monday and we will record it in live stream as well. Thanks again and I will adjourn this meeting.


USS Somerset was commissioned in Philadelphia Saturday. The commissioning ended a week-long celebration honoring the ship, her crew, and the legacy of the people who lost their lives on 9-11 Flight 93. The Navy's newest amphibious transport dock ship will be home ported in San Diego. Chief of Naval personnel, Vice Admiral Bill Moran, is scheduled to hold a live all-hands call tomorrow. He'll answer your questions and talk about issues that affect you and your family. Stories include pay-and-allowances, advancements, and uniforms. CNP will answer questions that come in by satellite and social media. Watch it live at 2 p.m. Eastern on direct to sailor and navy.mil. For more information, read more about these stories at navy.mil. From all hands update, thanks for watching.


Ilein Hogan, my name is Ilein Hogan and I am a lecturer in social policy in the school of applied social studies in UCC. I'm going to be presenting part of these slides in relation to our proposed project. Tom O'Mar, I hear my UCC colleague from the Office of the Vice-President for Teaching and Learning in UCC will be presenting some items as well. Various colleagues are here representing some of our proposed partner institutions. Unfortunately, not everyone could be here because of various teaching commitments, but you'll have an opportunity to speak with those later as well. Okay, so just to present the partners then, the project builds on existing networks. So one of the pre-existing projects that was funded through the National Forum is the social commons, which is ongoing and is a social policy discipline project which is looking at assessment as of and for learning. We're also partnering with others who've been previously involved in the Transformation through Collaboration project, which is another national forum project that focuses on digital skills development. So this project proposes to bring together all of those through seven partner institutions in total. So this is just briefly the national forum feedback on our project. What we're going to focus on specifically in this are some of the, well to respond to some of the criticisms. So one of those was looking at a perception that it was perhaps an overly instrumentalist approach. So we'll talk through some of that to clarify about the nature of resources and finally to speak in further detail about the impact of the project. So just to give a brief overview of the project, here we have the, well we heard about excited librarians and excited strategists. So this is the excited though somewhat bewildered social policy educator. So we found that while many of us are digital enthusiasts, we're not sure exactly how to proceed and are looking for guidance in how to develop our digital skills capacities. So this project proposes to bring together social policy educators and instructional designers and learning technologists and to look at how learning technologists can facilitate social policy educators in their journey towards becoming digital champions and to document that process and to evaluate the process. So these are the various project phases, some of which are overlapping. We've identified five key phases, one on identifying social policy educators' digital literacy needs, secondly responding to digital literacy needs, thirdly developing and practicing digital skills, fourthly recognising and rewarding technology enhanced teaching and learning practice and finally evaluating the project outcomes. And I'm going to invite Tom to speak now to each of those. Thank you very much. So I'm just going to spend a couple of minutes just talking about one or two aspects of how we identify digital needs. So in a previous life I worked for the National Out of Literacy Agency for nine years and I developed a number of different tools. And one of the tools we developed was to begin looking at diagnostic assessment for literacy learners. So one of the challenges in Ireland was that literacy learners rock up to a local literacy centre and they present and they're stuck into a class. And really there's no opportunity in many cases for individualised learning. So we developed a tool and write on.ai whereby we asked a whole series of 33 reflective questions and people answered yes, no. And depending on how they answered we then gave them a recommendation. So we identified a thing called a spiky profile for every learner. So this is not an alif right, this is coined by a lady called Helen Casey in the NRDC in the UK and the University of London. And the idea really was that every single learner exhibits a different spiky profile in terms of their own learning needs. So I thought well the same thing must apply to university lecturers and academics as well, we're not immune. So we're on and on training classes that one size fits all. What we decided we'd do is develop a tool, very simple and we'd ask people a series of questions. At the end of it everyone gets an individualised learning plan that identifies what their spiky profiles are. I think this probably goes to the idea of the instrumentalist question or query that came up with the feedback. Because very much what we're looking to do is put the learning in its own individual context. So not even a discipline context, yes there'll be a discipline context, but everyone have their own specific needs.  And equally then you're working across different institutions. So the idea first of all was to identify everyone's spiky profiles and give them a plan that they can take with them and learn with. And then respond to that by using existing resources. So I suppose the one thing we're being quite good at, we've worked on about three or four, actually nine national forum projects over the last number of years. So worked a lot of many of the colleagues here in the room today. So we're very keen to use a lot of existing resources. So tellu.me, for example, we developed in collaboration with CIT on a project I led last year. We're aware of allaboard.org. But we also use lynda.com, we use disk, disk, we use alt. We'd like to see all of those resources being used. And the most recent project was a project called Transformation Through Collaboration, which ran from January to June of this year. Many of the panel would be familiar with that one. So we have a lot of resources up there. So the idea is that we're going to actually build on that and use those same resources. We don't want to reinvent the wheel. And we want to just guide people I suppose towards the learning that's appropriate for them. Most of it will be non-accredited. A lot of it will be collaborative and unstructured. It's all about networking. It's all about people talking to each other. It's all about learning from each other. But for example, in UCC, we have an ECDL syllabus that's freely available to staff. So if that is a particular need, then we point them towards that and let them use that. We also run a post-graduate certification diploma and master's in teaching and learning on higher education. I think in the context of social studies, it's 90-70% of the academic staff in that department already have a post-graduate qualification in teaching and learning. So we're very keen to use those things. So what in UCD and Trinity and CIT and Waterflyty, they will have their own resources as well. So we'll try and build on those things and not have to reinvent the wheel. So I was just speaking to the pointer about Ola board, I suppose, as well. The idea as well, if you look at tellyou.me or if you look at instructional design at UCC.ie, if you look at digitalchampions.ie, what you'll see is you'll see a lot of case studies. So it's all about putting learning in context and saying to people, we can teach it a technical and mechanical skills of how to do something and how to blog, for example. But really what's more important is actually understanding why you would blog, or how you would blog, or how you'd build it into what you're trying to do with your students. Or not even with your students, you know, in your professional life outside of education. So really that's it in a nutshell, if I can hand back to you. A further element of that, would you like to speak to the digital badges? Sorry, yes. Skip the last slide. Sorry about that. So yes, go back to the idea of accreditation, non-accreditation. So we're aware that many people won't want to go back and do a postgraduate certificate or a diploma. So what we've done in UCC in the last six months, and the transformation project, was the first time we did this, was we gave out digital badges to digital champions across, 45 digital champions actually across seven institutions. And since then we've taken it on in UCC and we're actually rolling out digital badges to a number of different academic disciplines. So we very much see digital badges run an open badge factory or something very similar as being the way in which we would recognise much of the learning that happens outside of any formal structure. The next slide as well. Sorry, I should have actually read this. Okay. So the idea here was that... So someone asked a question that you wrote at a previous presentation about how do you involve the students in this? We're very much all about the students. So everything we do in terms of... If you look back and look at the transformation through a collaboration project, what you'll see there is that the students are the ones really that inform what the lecturers need to do. So in the last year in UCC we run an international... a student experience survey. And the student experience survey then informed the types of technology and house learning training that we've rolled out this year. So we've identified that in academics and said, listen, the students have come back and said, for example, inconsistent use of a VLE of a virtual learning environment is a huge problem within UCC. So we're now tackling that strategically over the next three years as we look to go to tender on a new VLE and build training into that to make sure that any academic, for example, who decides to use a VLE is actually being properly trained in using it. The Student Union and UCC are big supporters of this project. So we sit on numerous different committees with the Education Officer and the President of the Student Union. And they would regularly tell us the types of training that's required for staff. I think I actually am finishing on that one. I wouldn't mind what we designed it together. OK, so very briefly somewhere where time is flying by. I just want to speak to some of the alignment with the institutional and disciplinary strategies. So I suppose there's to a degree a kind of common language in speaking to the various respective institutions, the strategic plans, the teaching and learning strategies, and the emphasis on continuing professional development and drawing on the national forums, PDF or professional development framework in that. So I suppose again briefly there's some overlap with the principles within the PDF of collaboration, student centredness, authenticity, scholarship, and I'm forgetting one. I will remember it when I sit down. So I'll speak just a little bit around the discipline-specific ambitions then. So I suppose we're kind of cognisant that we have some strong links in terms of institutional partnerships at a research level, but far less so in terms of teaching and learning practice, and perhaps even generally within teaching and learning practices within social policy, although we do now have quite a number of staff members who have completed accredited training in teaching and learning in terms of scholarship, which is the one I was looking for. In terms of scholarship we have kind of a, there's a lot of work to do in terms of publishing teaching and learning related research within the discipline or related to the discipline of social policy. Another key issue is supporting integrative interdisciplinary learning within the discipline. So many of our students take social policy as a subject within an interdisciplinary programme and that would cover social care, social work, youth work, community development. They're the kind of the core social science, they're the core programmes, but also students take it as nursing students, dentistry, public health, government, occupational therapy. So social policy is a subject within a wide variety of programmes. So what are the challenges that students have in making connections between or about kind of the meaningfulness of social policy as a subject within their programme. So we hope that being able to articulate the disciplinary objectives through student involvement in digital learning and our own digital skills development that we can maximise that. Also a key issue is expanding the impact of the discipline. So I suppose if the success of Trump has taught us anything it's that we really need to up our game in terms of articulating the kind of the social justice mandate of social policy both within various digital platforms. So although we're well intentioned we need to develop our skills in that sphere. And that's connected to our own digital capacities as students, as educators, as professionals, but also as global citizens. Two minutes left. Okay great. Just to speak briefly to some of the short term impacts we envision in relation to the project. I've spoken a little bit about this already in terms of dissemination. We would have participation with very large staff cohort. We'd probably be looking at about 45 to 50 social policy educators across the seven participating institutions. We'd be using pre-existing resources but applying those to the discipline. So in that sense we'd be looking at developing discipline specific resources. We hope to contribute to international conferences and journals so those would be both e-learning or technology enhanced learning related but also disciplinary and again that's quite an underdeveloped sphere within the disciplinary conferences that teaching and learning activity. In terms of dissemination we also envision that these would be open access resources. Dialogue is a really important one. Again I suppose we can sometimes operate within silos and that's a negative impact on the discipline and the potential impact of the discipline. So this kind of project will support and will find impact in greater inter-institutional collaboration. We will have project presentations both in face-to-face and online contexts enhance student participation in terms of assessing and evaluating and informing teaching enhanced learning. I'm watching your approach. I think I've covered many of the issues in teaching and learning anyhow. Improve teaching approaches, improve confidence which goes back to our enthusiastic and excited but bewildered social policy educator. Some of the long-term impacts is on learning and learners I suppose because it is a very applied discipline we have perhaps been slow in embracing e-learning, blended learning more flexible learning opportunities so that's something that we're conscious of developing. The most significant thing and I'll finish on this point is that it does encourage us to introduce a culture change so it is about changing ways of thinking. We're as social policy educators reflective practice is something that's probably embedded within a lot of our teaching and practice but people have been somewhat reluctant or lacking in confidence when it comes to digital skills development. So it's about taking a cross institutional approach to promoting that sort of attitude and change and I'll leave it there. Thank you.


Well, it just happens to be Saturday afternoon, August the 3rd, Saturday August the 3rd, 2013. Toad. And welcome everyone. Welcome to progressive discussions. Another week has flown by quickly, as usual. Just like the months and the seasons and the years fly by. And I'm your host for progressive discussions, James P. Madonna of Megalife 21. The hardest-hitting internet talk radio station on the planet. And I am here, live and prerecorded. Well, when you see it, it's prerecorded. Coming from the newsletter-sensored research center in northeastern New Jersey. And I will now. This is my new prop because the Blackthorn Shaleli is taking a vacation, hiatus. This is an authentic deer antler. It's not taking a dirt sleep. No, no, no. It's just on hiatus. It's on hyena. I mean hyena. Hyenas are not picky at all. Hernia, hiatal hernia. As to what they will eat. My brother-in-law, the great white hunter. Deer hunter. Well, yeah, actually deer hunting.  He rather just- Why don't I just get in the duck car? Wait, call the ducks out. Boom!  It is mocked, it is made fun of, it is maligned. And yet it's a cute- Not daffy duck. It's a cute animal. Well, daffy ducks spits too much like Sylvester the cat. Right? I think so. I love daffy duck. Yeah, he's cute. Although I haven't seen him in years. Ducks are cute, man. Just like bunny rabbits, you know? I mean, and they're quite smart. Rhinoceroses are not cute. Well, you, my friend, do not like some of my- You do not- Insects are not cute. You do not like legatos, otherwise known as lizis, which I love. I love reptiles. I love tortoises, turtles. What is psycho again? Amphibians, and I love- What is psycho? Psycho is one of the tarantulas owned by our director- Because what is he? He's building a new- IT. environment for him? IT division. They already have a new environment. They have an automatic thermostatic-controlled heating pad- On a big cast-iron stand, rack. For a steak inch tarantula. Scorpions, too. And tarantulas, and the food that is fed to them. They're all thermostatically controlled with an automatic timer. High technology, man. Oh, my God. Tech Redneck. Oh, my God. Anyway, let me formally pipe a board with my authentic Bosun's whistle. My- No insects allowed. The illustri- The illustri- Oh, I'll be bringing the hissing cockroaches over soon. The door will be locked. When they put on bulk. I want- I need them to put on more size. They're already this long. More size. Anyway, pipe a board, formerly pipe a board, my co-host and mentor. The pulp of the internet. The illustri- The one and only. The founder of Newsletter Censored in 1977. Excuse me. And welcome aboard our progressive liberal starship. The Reverend Dr. William J. Eisenman. How are you feeling today? Make it so. Huh? Make it so. Make what so? The Picard says all the time to get the starship moving. Make it so.  Well, that's what he says to the driver, the whatever he is. You like Sulu, it used to be. I thought it was on- I thought computers was on automatic pilot or something. Well, you got to throw it in. You got to throw the trajectory in. That doesn't make sense. Make it so. Make it so.  I like Kirk's phrases. Warp speed. Is that what he says? Warp to, warp. He mentions the warp, right? Warp, yeah. Well, whatever. Yeah. You got to go somewhere. You got to use warp drive. Well, speaking of warp, Washington sure is warped. The Congress. Now, let me start because I got a lot of things. Congress is now at 7%. Popularity? Popularity. Approval, right? Approval. Well, they deserve less. Well, they're on vacation, buddy. You see them running down the steps yesterday? They're always on vacation. I hear that they took, I think, July off. They came back for August and they're only scheduled to work two days, the Republican Congress. And they're only scheduled to work on nine days in September. Mr. Boehner says, don't worry, we'll get the job done. Yeah. Repealing. What job? Repealing Obamacare. Certainly not creating jobs. No, they're too busy repealing Obamacare. 40th time. All right. For the 40th time. Now, you know. Well, I got a lot to read, so hurry up. It wouldn't be bad if they would want to repeal the part and improve the parts that should be repealed and improved. But they just want to take away the whole thing. Yeah, they sure want to take away the whole thing except for the money going to their rich buddies and to themselves. That they don't want to take away. Okay. I just, I'll start off with something light and the rest is heavy, heavy duty, right?  It's like, it's all on the back and there's nothing in the front.  Most of them are hideous, you know, and I don't know who's in charge of the fashion industry if it's the same group of people that are in charge of Hollywood, but it sure sucks. I mean, the people that are getting paid really good salaries do not necessarily make the right smart decisions and are not necessarily talented. Obviously you should not go see the punk exhibition. It's who they know in America. It's who you know. It's punk fashion. Oh, well I know about that. Yeah, but it's got a big exhibit of it somewhere. Oh, okay.  Anyway, Republican Senator John Corrine of Texas. Corrine. Corrine. Corrine. You've got a Y in there. Yeah, Corrine. Yeah, well whatever. Of Texas said, there is no good reason why Detroit or any other American city ought to receive a taxpayer funded bailout from Washington, but Senator John Corrine, Republican, voted for a taxpayer funded bailout of Wall Street and big banks.  But no. Now, Becky, you won't take away subsidies from Exxon Mobil and all the big boys. But no American city should be bailed out by Washington. Well, cities are the public sector. See, the things he likes are the private sector. They are out to destroy all in the public sector so that the private sector can control the country. Okay. Well, we all know how efficient privatization is, right? Oh, yeah. Well, it's good for them because that's where they get their money.  That's correct. Yeah. Human nature never changes over the millennia, right? It never changes. It's just as vile and wicked and selfish and sinful as it always was.  Anyway, but of course these, what would you call them? Adaptive supporters, sycophants. Is that the same category? A sycophant and an adaptive supporter. Sycophant is a supporter obviously, yeah. They call us haters and troublemakers and instigators for telling the truth. I guess they called Martin Luther King and Gandhi and all the reformers of the world the same. Troublemakers. They were maligned. They were killed. They were... What about the apostles? They were maligned. I love them, madam. They were killed. They were killed, it is. Murdered. Yeah. What are you telling the truth? George Carlin was, the late great George Carlin was touching upon some things like that. I posted a very good video of him discussing right to lifers and abortion and the whole subject of abortion and he really gets right to the point about conservatives caring about the fetus, but once you're born they don't give a damn about you. That's correct. And now you see after the Supreme Court struck down the part of the Voting Rights Act all of the Republican control legislatures in the country are now putting through all of their garbage laws and of course their anti-abortion laws. Well, I'm going to get to something quite interesting that's sort of related to that. Okay, each member of Congress spends an average of $383 per month for coffee and food in their office. For them? For them. Each. And if they have a little guess. Yeah. Okay. Which is more than most families receive in SNAP or food stamp benefits. Again, how many days on average do they work in Congress? And they want to cut SNAP. Remember that. So this is funny, $383 per month for coffee and food per Congress person, in this case it's mostly Republicans, which is more than what poor families get for food stamps. And they want to cut food stamps again. And in my new, these Congress people work very little. They work far less than part-time. The word work should be not used. Yeah, not work. Or in quotes. Repeal. Everything Obama wants. That's what they do. They keep on repealing. The same thing with when you're discussing a rich person, do not ever use the term earn. Oh, forget it. Okay. Because they do not earn their money. Well, once you officially become a millionaire, your money pretty much makes money on its own. That's great. If you invest wisely, you have a real smart, certified financial planner, your money will make money. So as far as any rich person telling them, you want to tax my, you want to tax my hard earned money.   Okay. Now, interesting. Now, this is crazy. Oh boy. Mark, this is a man, Mark Obenshain, which is the state of Virginia attorney general said, if a woman in Virginia has a miscarriage without a doctor present, be assured, they must report it within 24 hours to the police or risk going to jail for a full year. Wow. Talk about religious nuts in the red state Bible Belt area.  That's an abortion. Okay. You think a woman wants to have a miscarriage?  All I want them. So we're all demonized. Well, of course, we're demonized. What about the sins that they, they, they, they're guilty of? They... Political corruption and financial sins. They see the moat in your eye and not the beam in their own. They're hypocrites. They are hypocrites. They're the ultimate hypocrites of all time. Is it, is it, is it a conservative right wing? Okay. Interesting. Now this last section is also very interesting. It's the last inductee into our Chisler's Hall of Shame. The other inductees, of course, is the Attorney General of Virginia and, um, and, uh, you know, the, the Republican, Republicans making Assenheim statements. They never fails to amaze me every week. They just get, make stupider and stupider, uh, remarks that they, uh, they, they go public with, which is really shocking. Members of, uh, Republican Congress for wasting taxpayers' money that they say Democrats are, are known for, wasting taxpayers' money. Not their taxes, because they're rich. They don't pay taxes. I mean the middle class. So all these people, John Corrine, Mark Obenshane, members of Congress, they're all guilty. They're all inductees into the Chisler's Hall of Shame. And now the big, the big inductee, Walmart. Walmart employs 2.1 million workers. Two thirds of these are in the United States. In 2012, revenue is, or was, three times that of Apple, computer, and 15 times of McDonald's. Walmart pays employees, on average, $8.81 per hour. Okay. Four Walmart family members. We mean, I'm talking about the upper echelon, right? The muckity mucks. Four Walmart family members made $20 billion in 2012. Each. That's just, that's just 2012. That might be collectively. I don't know. They didn't specify. No, it's each. Really? 80 billion. Do you, do you, could you imagine that? And they have the nerve to pay their employees a slightly above minimum wage. That's correct. It's sickening. It's sickening.  Oh, I love people. Oh, yeah, yeah. Conservatives are close to God.  All right. Let me finish this. They do have the power, though. Huh? They do have the power. Because they, they, they, they own the media. They own the government. They own the government. Well, the government is our only bulwark against the strength of the corporations and the rich. Yeah. Well, the corporations. So they destroy the government, make it smaller. Yeah. We have no fighting force. The corporations have bought the FDA, the USDA, congressmen, senators, the media because corporations are the sponsors, correct? They, they, they bought them all. So, all right. Walmart stores cost U.S. taxpayers over $1.7 million per year because they pay their employees so little that they must rely on public assistance. And many Walmart employees are collecting public assistance to survive. Food stamps and Medicare. That's right. Because their pay is so low. Our typical American salaries, far below the cost of living, they can't afford to live on it. Once upon a time in this country, when they middle class and people were doing well. Yeah. When the corporations made profits, some of those profits went to wage hikes. But some 30-some years ago, that all stopped. And the profits became huge, and huge. And the CEO's pay sure did. And the CEO's pay got hugeer and hugeer. Yep, yep, yep, yep. And the wages were stagnant and did not grow. Even today, they are 4% lower than they were. Is it any wonder the economy is not bustling? No money for the 70% of the economy that is the consumers. No disposable income.  Well, all the new poor mainstream, they don't have surplus cash to put back into the economy. Welfare, the only surplus cash they had before was because they borrowed it. Right. Okay. I mean, the poor and the unemployed and the homeless, of course, don't have anything to put back into the economy. And the middle class that are left, the people that should thank their lucky stars to still have a full-time job, so far, they don't have the surplus cash to put back into the economy. But there are people that I noticed that are driving around in expensive cars, even young people that somehow, the kids today, they don't want to start like we did with an older used car. They all seem to have to have a new vehicle. So what you're saying is all the new stuff that you see people having now are all borrowed on credit? Borrowed credit? Yeah, credit. Borrowed money. So I guess the repossess by the repo man is going to have a lot of work ahead of him. Definitely.  Like, it's almost like that vehicle belongs to them. Because they see it as stealing. But they don't own the vehicle until it's paid for. People don't understand that. We don't own our houses. We don't own our cars. If they're borrowed, if they're, you know, credit, borrowed money, we don't own them.  You don't own land. And we've done many stories about that. And if you paid off your land, and you do own it, the government can come and take it by eminent domain. Well, you remember that old... Give it to some big, private cook. You remember the story about the elderly, retired couple that had to get rid of their bird feeder? I think it was Allendale, New Jersey, or Ridgewood. No, I think it was Clifford. Well, anyway, they were... No, it was... One of these right here. It was a Burden County town, but they were ordered by the town that their bird feeder wasn't... Wasn't a bird feeder. It wasn't the kind of bird feeder that they wanted them to have, so they told them they couldn't have it. Meanwhile, this was probably... They probably had their mortgage all paid up if they were retired people. Maybe. And maybe, most likely, it was because when old people buy their homes, it was back in the day. And back in the day, the mortgages were low. But they may be on a reverse mortgage today. Yeah, we don't know. But the point is, you don't really own your home. That's it. I mean, if you pay off the mortgage, you may own the building, but you don't own the land. That's why you got to get a permit for this and that. Oh, you want a high stockade fence for privacy? You better not be too high. You can't even have a victory vegetable garden in your front yard, only in the backyard. I almost had grass. Right, that has to be cut. A nice manicured lawn. And it gives you nothing in return with the money you spend...  And weeds. Weeds. If you're into dandelion salad, I guess. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you want to raise your own hens for eggs? Oh, no. The town won't let you do that unless you're in an area where the community will allow you to. But you can't do anything. But it's okay for you to pay the super high property taxes in suburbia, right? That's okay. Well, I got news for you. We pay high property taxes. Most of it goes to education. The reason we do that is because the rich don't pay their share. I thought here in New Jersey, they like closing schools and laying off teachers? Well, they're trying to do that, of course.  They want to privatize education to Republicans. Once upon a time, the lottery was supposed to take an hour of education. What happened? Now they want to privatize the lottery. Casino gambling in Atlantic City was supposed to go to the needy. Yeah. Remember? Because the lottery, no money is going to go to the education anymore. No. But since they don't want education in the first place because they don't want the poor and the middle class becoming smart.  Dumb down the mainstream. But that's why only the rich kids can afford to go to private school. That's how it was in the old days, and they want those days back. Ah, the old days of what? Feudalism? The kings, the queens, the princes. Feudalistic oligarch? Feudalism, whatever you want. Well, now the feudalism is a corporate plutocracy. It's fascism. That's what it's become. The country is a fascism. Someone said on Facebook the other day, all it is socialism, socialism, socialism. There's no socialism. The country is fascist. When you got the corporations married to the state, it's fascism. Ask Mr. Mussolini. He'll tell you. You know, I once had this punk know-it-all that was, he bragged that he was part of, he was one of the leaders of this nationwide organization comprised of young republicans, young people that were conservative. Of course there were rich kids, most likely, with a silver spoon in their mouth. And he did not debate or comment the contents of our shows. Of course not. He talked about how our shows are not viral. We do not have hundreds of thousands or millions of hits. And he put us down and he says, you are beneath me. I would never debate you because you don't have, you don't have hundreds of thousands or millions of hits. I says, well, you know, thinking about it, Honey Boo Boo's, Honey Boo Boo's season opener, right off the bat, had like, I think, over two million viewers. Well, Jesus only had 120. Jesus himself had only 120. He was the best teacher in the world. Of all time. Better than Joe Olstein and Rick Warren and Pat Roberts. Prosperity preaches. Yeah. And he only had 120, you know, what you would call followers. Unbelievable. So, you know, attention, being in a spotlight, money, accumulating a large sum of money in the devil's world, it's not necessarily, well, it's not a fair world, obviously. So the more informative you are, the more educational you are, the more you tell the real truth. The less audience you will have. Mainstream audience you will have. Look at Gary, no, as brilliant as Gary is, and he's got his progressive radio network, which is awesome. No, nobody's going to fight. A lot of people listen. No station manager or sponsors are going to censor anybody on there. Okay, but he only has so much of the population. You know that you can listen to radio now. And he belongs on MSNBC. He was on it. He was on WMCA once. MSNBC? Gary made appearances. That does not suit his work. MSNBC? No, MSNBC never existed. Not then. He was on WMC. Forget about radio, I'm talking about what really grabs massive amounts of people. TV, cable, cable. Cable TV does not have the audiences, you think. MSNBC does not have the audiences, I think? Maybe over 500,000 people. You're kidding me. No.  Yeah. So Ed Schultz, the Ed Schultz show, only has a small segment of the population. Fox has more. Well, that doesn't surprise me. There's a station that does not know the truth if it tripped over it, but it's quite professional. Has great sets, et cetera. And... And... It has gorgeous looking blonde women. Waspy looking. I don't know about waspy, but they sure are gorgeous. Well, they're not minority women. I noticed. No, they're not. They're not women of color on Fox. I think they have one or two, but...   Hey. There's a pattern here. You heard what the pope you said. Who am I to judge? Who am I to judge?  Listen. Finally, somebody got into somebody's head that we're not here to be judged. Listen, the women on Fox, I affectionately call the conservative coven of witches. And there are more than you think. And yes, Ann Coulter, the snake-headed...