WSU Digest – for the week of Feb. 16 On the Calendar

This 10th Partnership in Employment annual career fair will be held from 3-7 p.m. Feb. 19 at the Red Lion at the Park in Spokane. Sponsored by Whitworth College, Gonzaga University, Eastern Washington University and WSU Spokane, the career fair attracts both local and national employers. For more information, see https://www.partnershipfair.com/

Washington State University will induct five former athletes, coaches and administrators into the WSU Athletic Hall of Fame in ceremonies Feb. 21 at the Compton Union Building.  Headlining this year’s induction will be long-time women’s coach and administrator Carol Gordon, Olympic gold medalist Julius Korir, men’s basketball coach George Raveling, who guided WSU to two NCAA tournaments, one of Washington’s most successful prep coaches, Linda Sheridan, and All-America football player Mike Utley. All but Korir are slated to attend the induction ceremonies. The WSU Athletic Hall of Fame reception will begin at 6 p.m. at the CUB Ballroom in Pullman, with dinner scheduled for 7 p.m., followed by the induction ceremonies. For more details on the event and the inductees, see https://wsucougars.ocsn.com/genrel/012104aab.html

In the news

Can bigger be better? Last week’s news of the attempt by Comcast, the nation’s largest cable-television provider, to take over entertainment giant Disney, which owns theme parks, movie studios, television stations, ESPN and ABC, touched off fears among some critics concerned that ever-larger media companies are further undermining diversity and credibility in the media marketplace. But David Demers, associate professor in Washington State University’s Murrow School of Communication, says that his research and theoretical model doesn’t support the dominant popular view — that large-scale media organizations are destroying democracy and good journalism. In fact, Demers says his empirical research on newspapers provides a substantial amount of evidence that news content improves and becomes more critical of established institutions of power as organizations increase in size and complexity. Demers acknowledges that all media organizations can do bad things. But he says no systemic empirical evidence supports the idea that the diversity of ideas declines as media organizations grow. Demers can be reached at 509.335.5608 or ddemers@wsu.edu.

Problems with the WASL: Discussions of the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) continue during the current legislative session in Olympia. Donald C. Orlich, professor emeritus of the WSU Science Mathematics Engineering Education Center, testified last month before the Senate Education Committee about the problems he sees in the WASL test. Orlich says there are four major flaws: the WASL is an unreliable and invalid measure of student achievement; the WASL has several questions that are not aligned with Washington’s education standards; the WASL shows a bias against minority children (black, Native American and Hispanic) and children who live in poverty situations; and special education students and children who are not native English speakers nearly all fail the WASL. Orlich can be contacted at 509.335.4844 or dorlich@wsu.edu