How do "open enrollment" charter schools end up with selective student bodies? Watch the CharterLand video and find out. (You can download the game board here.)

The Internet's beloved Jennifer Lawrence has been gracing late night talk shows with her presence to promote the latest  film opening soon. The 23-year-old actor shared drunken stories from her last Oscar appearance on Late Night With Seth Meyers. Lawrences admits to getting so drunk she puked on some rich person's balcony, and she felt Miley Cyrus passing judgement behind her. 

Cyrus responded on Twitter and said that never happened, but deleted the tweet. Maybe the blue mutant was exaggerating or she mistook the pop sensation for someone else? We still love you even if you might have stretched the truth, Jennifer.


We just don't want your drinking to get out of hand.

The NPS Harpers Ferry Center published this Youtube video encouraging Tucsonans to join the revolution ... a stewardship revolution. The video includes narrations by the late, great Mardy "Grandmother of the Conservation Movement" Murie. There are great shots of our desert wildlife and local busy intersections.

Join the residents of Tucson as they mobilize to protect their neighboring community, the Saguaro Wilderness. Located just outside the city, Saguaro National Park and its Sonoran Desert have become a source of pride for Tucsonans and is a celebrated part of the city's collective identity. As this fragile ecosystem becomes ever more endangered, the people of Tucson come together and rally around their role as stewards of this backyard wilderness.

The two-minute clip perfectly captures the Old Pueblo and our unrivaled desert surroundings:

With the contentious Sunnyside Unified School District governing board recall election behind us, the next school board election to pay attention to is Tucson Unified School District. If it's anything like the TUSD 2012 election, voters will have another cast of characters to choose from (See "The District's Dozen," Sept. 20, 2012). Ten potential candidates filed campaign financial statements with the Pima County Recorder's office in order to begin collecting signatures to qualify for the Nov. 14, 2014 general election ballot.

In 2012, three incumbents were in the race—Mark Stegeman, Miguel Cuevas and Alexandre Sugiyama. Stegeman was the only incumbent to win his seat back, with then-candidates Kristel Foster and Cam Juarez filling the other vacancies and creating a three-way majority voting block with Adelita Grijalva.

Grijalva, a TUSD board member for more than 10 years, is going for another term. Michael "Burritos are Magical" Hicks is the other incumbent reportedly readying another run. The expectation is that all candidates who've filed campaign financial statements are working on petition signatures. Filing period for those signatures opens July 7 and closes Aug. 6 at 5 p.m.

Those who've filed statements for the two incumbents' seats are: David King, Debe Campos-Fleenor, Rene Bernal, Betts Putnam-Hidalgo, Don Cotton, Jen Darland, Francis Saitta and Miguel Cuevas (yes, Miguel Cuevas).

This is a nonpartisan election, but a majority in the progressive Baja Arizona-sphere are saying they hope Grijalva returns to her seat, with others wondering if voters will ask what's she's accomplished her 10 years in office. Filling Hicks seat is going to be a box-checking challenge for them because many like Betts Putnam-Hidalgo, who ran but lost in 2012; and they also like Jen Darland, a public education advocate affiliated with the Arizona Education Network. Both have children in TUSD schools and both are undeniably public education supporters. Also remarkable about both candidates is their knowledge of the district, with Darland especially knowledgeable about our crazyland state Legislature (See "Ethics 101," May 28, 2009

Other returning candidates who ran in 2012 include Don Cotton and Debe Campos-Fleenor, but The Range is expecting Francis Saitta will be an interesting interview if he makes it on the ballot. Saitta, a Pima Community College instructor who ran for PCC governing board in 2012 (See "The Issue of Admission," Oct. 18, 2012), didn't want to do a sit-down interview and only respond to email questions if given to all candidates:

We explained that the Weekly's policy is not to do email interviews. His response: "An interview, under those circumstances, is inherently unfair, and, as a comparative of candidate positions, uninformative. All candidates should be asked the same question. Otherwise one introduces tendentiousness into the interview process."

Hope you weren't hoping for a boring election.

May 25th is Geek Pride Day. And why not; everyone else has a day, even fools. So, to honor the day, and feed your inner geek, I thought it might be the proper occasion to explore some hi-tech terms.

Let’s start with hi-tech itself. For that I need to begin with technology, which is a compound of two Greek words, “techno”, meaning “art or skill, and “logia”, which means a treatise or discourse. Technology came into English in the early 1600’s meaning a treatise on skilled arts and crafts. Its meaning later narrowed so that it referred more specifically to the body of knowledge of mechanical arts and sciences—technical know-how.

Hi-tech illustrates two common ways that language evolves: people shorten words and compound them, which is how we got hi-tech. The first documented use was a mention of a hi-tech home in the 1972 Whole Earth Catalogue. As a standalone contraction, tech came later, when in the 1980’s it referred to industries specializing in, well, technology. Techie began as college slang for students in technical fields, then expanded to anyone knowledgeable in the technical details that for most of us cause our eyes to glaze over. 
Many techies are nerds, which was a substitute for someone who is a square. No one is quite certain how the word nerd originated, but it might be based on a comical Dr. Seuss character, a made-up, human-like animal with an over-sized head—sounds about right. Of course, with the rise of technology, it became sort of cool to be a nerd, although increasingly nerds proudly prefer to be called geeks. That’s probably from a very old Germanic word “geck” for a fool of the simpleton sort, which is not how geeks are viewed today.

Today, geeks are most closely associated with computers. Interestingly, computer originally meant a human, coined in the 1600’s to refer to a person who performed calculations. Computer derived from Latin “putare” meaning to reckon, “com”, a Latin prefix meaning together (eg., combination), and the suffix “er”, for a person who does these kinds of things (eg., a grocer). In the 1800’s, computer transferred to mechanical calculating devices, so naturally was applied to electronic calculating machines when they were invented in the 1940’s.

Geeks invented robots, machines that perform mundane human tasks. Robot stems from a 1920 play by Czechoslovakian Karel Capek. He used “robotnik”, meaning humans in forced labor, which was from the Slavik root “robota” meaning slave and the suffix “nik”, meaning a group of persons, like Beatniks. The English translation of Capek’s play shortened it to robot. Science fiction writers such as Isaac Asimov later popularized robots as intelligent machines. The Jetsons made them loveable. Computers have made them possible.

Speaking of loveable, remember R2-D2 and C-3PO, a couple of stars in the Star Wars movies, who filmmaker George Lucas called droids. Lucas didn’t quite make up this word on his own. An Encyclopedia from 1728 claimed that the scholar Albertus Magnus made an “androides” way back in the 13th century, meaning a human-like automaton—from Greek “andro” meaning “man”, and “eides” meaning “shape”. Lucas clipped this to droid, then made a gazillion dollars by trademarking and licensing the word.

Don’t confuse a robot or android with cyborg, which is a fusion of electronics with an actual human. Cyborg is a contraction of “cybernetics” and “organism”, then compounds them. We’re not cyborgs yet, although the makers of Android and other smart phones are giving it a go.

Also in Star Wars, Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker battled using sabers that shot out “light amplified by stimulated emission of radiation”, the scientific name given by the computer nerds who invented the intense beam of light that is so narrow because the wavelengths of the atoms are identical. Fortunately, in 1960 someone came up with a manageable acronym for it: l-a-s-e-r. Oddly, we pronounce the “s” in laser as a “z”, maybe because “lazer” just sounds like it is “zzzzzapping” something? Or perhaps it’s just a lazy pronunciation.

Scientific inventions just seem to scream for geeky new words to describe them. Radar is another example. Radar detects the position of distant objects by aiming radio waves at an object, then measuring the time the waves take to bounce back. Radar developed as practical device at the beginning of World War II, which the British used effectively in defending against German aerial attacks during the Battle of Britain. The word is an acronym, more or less, of “radio detection and ranging.” Radio itself, as an electromagnetic wave, comes from Latin “radiatus” meaning to shine, or radiate.

Happy Geek Pride Day. Now, beam me up, Scotty. 

I know the heartland is filled with self sufficient, rural folk who don't believe in government handouts. At least that's what Republicans tell me, so it must be as true, as true as their contention that urban dwellers just want to live on the dole.

So why this?

In the House Republicans' proposed agriculture and food safety budget, they included a demonstration program to test ways to get meals to low income children during the summer when school isn't in session. The program has been around since 2010. Their plan is to add $27 million to continue the program, but all the money is supposed to be spent in rural areas. Not a penny for urban areas. How did they explain excluding urban kids from the summer meals program? They didn't, but a Republican spokeswoman confirmed it was true.

Looking for a reason to move to Tucson? The Tucson Young Professionals are hosting a #thisistucson Launch Party from 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 22, at the Hacienda del Sol Guest Ranch Resort, 5501 N Hacienda Del Sol Road. .

#thisistucson is a city-wide social media campaign that allows people to express why they live in and love the Old Pueblo. For instance, I would say "The Tucson Weekly, and Carnitas, Duh," but no one asked me.

General Admission tickets are $25, and they include appetizers and drink coupons. Click here or the flier above for more information.

Everyone weighed in on the infamous short, celebratory kiss that aired during the NFL Draft. Michael Sam, NFL's first openly gay athlete, kissed his boyfriend after he was recruited by the St. Louis Rams. A knock off Texas version of The View received their 15-minutes of fame after Dallas morning co-host Amy Kushnir expresses her disdain for Sam's public display of affection. She said it was forced on the general public and to think about the children. Thankfully, Cooper dug up some footage of Kushner kissing a couple of male strippers  during a previous episode.

Your prayers have been answered, nerds. J.J. Abrams sent a message from the Star Wars set to tease us, and formally announce the Star Wars: Force for Change initiative. This is an effort to raise funds and awareness for UNICEF's Innovation Labs and its innovative projects benefiting children in need.

Star Wars: Force for Change wants to create a brighter tomorrow for thousands of kids and families around the world. With your help and creativity we can develop innovative solutions to some of the world’s biggest challenges. By acting as a Force for Change, your donation to support UNICEF’s Innovation Labs and other innovative work for children will fund dozens of life-changing projects like these in communities across the globe: • Portable, solar-powered learning kits being built in China, Uganda, and Burundi to ensure every child in the world has access to relevant, quality learning. • Mobile phone application developed in South Sudan and Uganda, and used in the Philippines, that helps reunite children with their families after an emergency. • A text messaging solution in Zambia that helps families receive infant medical test results from clinics, in half the time, through mobile phones. Join us! Help create a brighter tomorrow for thousands of kids and families. Be a force for change.

Every contribution offers exclusive Star Wars memorabilia AND A CHANCE TO BE AN EXTRA IN THE NEW STAR WARS FILM, and the proceeds go to a really good cause. Incentives include concept art, Episode VII script signed by J.J. Abrams and limited edition light hilt. Basically, this is a Kickstarter that doesn't suck.

Click here to win bragging rights at every comic-con, ever.

It's a huge swing. Courtesy of yesterday's landslide recall election, Sunnyside School District has gone from a 3-2 majority supporting Superintendent Manuel Isquierdo to a 4-1 majority which is likely to scrutinize his every move, and maybe get rid of him early. But after the much-deserved victory celebrations are over, it'll be time for people to take the stars out of their eyes and realize change is going to be a long, slow, expensive haul. Let's have high hopes for the new board, but let's also have reasonable expectations.

Isquierdo has little credibility left in the district or the community. The new board would probably be wise to get rid of him and look for someone who is less of a self-aggrandizing salesman and district bully and more of a solid educator with vision and integrity. But getting rid of Isquierdo won't come cheap. It's going to cost over half a million dollars for the district to buy out the remainder of his contract.

Is it worth it? He's got two years left on his contract. That's two years of board-superintendent pitched battles and gridlock. And it's probably two more years of voters denying the district a much-needed bond override. It's going to be hard to make positive change when the district has to cut millions from its budget. Should they give Isquierdo a half million dollar check to get the district back on track sooner rather than later? It's a tough call. The new board will take flak no matter what it decides.