The New York Times – A group of Washington State University journalism students spent 11 days in Cuba, meeting Cuban journalists at state-run newspapers and Radio Havana, along with ordinary Cubans, from a taxi driver to a hairdresser. The trip was authorized under U.S. rules as educational, and professors kept careful records of their itineraries, as required by regulations — even though they’ve never, from past trips, been asked for proof of their activities.
The Charlotte Observer – Modern dads may change diapers and fill sippy cups, but you still won’t catch them using baby talk. That’s according to a new study by researchers at Washington State University, Spokane, who found that while mothers often use high-pitched tones and varied cadences to communicate with their babies and toddlers, fathers play it straight, speaking to their little ones as if they were adults. “Moms raised their pitch by around 40 hertz,” a verifiable change in sound, said Mark VanDam, a WSU-Spokane assistant professor in the speech and hearing sciences department. “Dads had no statistical effect at all.”