The Nation
Graduation speakers mostly women in 2018
For the first time in at least two decades, the majority of the nation’s top colleges are featuring women as their spring commencement speakers, a shift that industry experts credit to the wave of female empowerment that has fueled the #MeToo movement.
Yale is bringing Hillary Clinton. MIT will host Sheryl Sandberg. Vanderbilt landed Amal Clooney, and Dartmouth chose Mindy Kaling.
Overall, women account for nearly 60 percent of the speakers at the 25 schools that have the largest endowments and traditionally carry the clout to draw big names to the lectern. By contrast, women made up just a quarter of the speakers at those schools over the previous 19 years, according to an Associated Press analysis of university records.
“There’s been a much bigger push to bring in white females, black females — anyone other than a white male,” said Richard Schelp, owner of Executive Speakers Bureau in Memphis, Tennessee, where 40 percent of recent booking requests from schools and other clients have been for women. “We’re digging deep into our reservoir of resources.”
Minnesota
School bus driver accused of texting
MINNEAPOLIS — A Minneapolis-area school bus driver is accused of texting while driving and looking up jokes on her cellphone.
Thirty-nine-year-old Brenda Carsten is charged in Anoka County District Court with more than a dozen misdemeanor and gross-misdemeanor charges of child endangerment. Her first court appearance is June 6.
Authorities say the charges stem from video and audio taken on the bus in Blaine on Feb. 6 showing Carsten driving erratically and children moving around the bus while it was on the road.
Carsten allegedly had both hands off the steering wheel and was looking up “your mama” jokes on her phone. At one point, authorities say she handed the cellphone to a student to read the jokes over the bus intercom.
Kentucky
Janitor wills $175,000 to child abuse victims
COVINGTON — A Kentucky man who worked as a school janitor for more than three decades and never touched a dime of his pension has willed his life savings of $175,000 to child abuse victims.
The Kentucky Enquirer reported Alvin L. Randlett’s estate donated the sum to the Kentucky Child Victims’ Trust Fund on Tuesday. The lifelong Covington resident had retired in 2001, and died in December 2015 at age 75.
The money came from Randlett’s pension and the sale of his house.
Indiana
Seven dogs receive oxygen after house fire
HEBRON — Seven dogs found unconscious in a smoke-filled Indiana garage during a house fire were saved by first responders and neighbors who raced to give them oxygen.
State Police say the seven Labradors, two of them pregnant, were pulled unconscious from the garage Tuesday near the northwestern Indiana town of Hebron.
As first responders performed CPR on the dogs, officers and neighbors opened the canines’ airways and blew air into their lungs. Paramedics then used special “pet masks” to give the canines more oxygen.
Wire reports
