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3 weeks ago | 
ecmag.com | Andrea Klee |Susan DeGrane
Starting at 7 a.m., first-, second- and third-year apprentices at the IBEW-NECA Technical Institute in Alsip, Ill., spend 30 minutes walking the perimeter of the campus, then drop in the parking lot for calisthenics—squats, lunges, knee bends and push-ups. They also do core-strengthening yoga poses such as planks and standing side planks. For all three cohorts, physical training (PT) happens outside, in temperatures as low as 20ºF and on mostly clear days.
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1 month ago | 
ecmag.com | Andrea Klee |Susan DeGrane
The Boston metropolitan area serves as an international hub of higher learning and is home to more than 50 colleges and universities, including Harvard, MIT and Tufts. Among the area’s largest private schools is Northeastern University with 38,000 students. This explains why the recent renovation of the school’s 200,000-square-foot, four-story Snell Library was a monumental undertaking.
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Dec 29, 2024 | 
chicagotribune.com | Susan DeGrane
Joel Gomez, of Blue Island, knows the excitement of “buck fever.” He’s also among a growing number of hunters who have experienced the sensation within Chicago’s city limits. Late on a Saturday afternoon in the waning days of October, Gomez sat 15 feet off the ground in a deer stand at the center of a 30-acre wooded area newly designated for deer hunting during the 2024/25 season at William W. Powers State Recreation Area on Chicago’s Southeast Side.
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Dec 5, 2024 | 
ecmag.com | Susan DeGrane
In linear, direct current circuits, strength of the current is directly proportional to the voltage, and inversely proportional to the resistance: I = V/R. Of all the theories concerning electricity, this law developed by Georg Simon Ohm remains the most practical to the electrical industry. IBEW apprentices throughout the United States and world continue to learn its applications.
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Nov 15, 2024 | 
chicagotribune.com | Susan DeGrane
On a crisp Saturday morning in early November, Kayla Lindsay Fisher led a small group of birders on a tour of recent habitat restoration efforts affecting the Powderhorn Prairie and Marsh Nature Preserve on Chicago’s Southeast Side. The group gathered at 133rd Street and Avenue K, in a parking lot near a boat launch at the southern tip of the Wolf Lake channel. In the stillness, they could hear water draining into Wolf Lake.
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Nov 15, 2024 | 
ecmag.com | Susan DeGrane
Slips, trips and falls happen all the time, but most frequently in winter. Because falls are the third leading cause of work-related injuries, the National Safety Council (NSC) continues to share a 2023 webinar, “Slips, Trips and Falls: Winter Weather,” to help employers prevent weather-related falls. Falls account for 20% of work-related injuries every year, according to the NSC. Besides causing pain, a typical fall injury results in 14 days of missed work.
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Oct 30, 2024 | 
chicagotribune.com | Susan DeGrane
Children dressed as goblins, princesses, animals and action figures flooded Eisenhower High School in Blue Island on Thursday evening, where groups from the school and community were on hand to pass out treats and have fun. The children came with parents, many who also dressed up, from Blue Island, Alsip, Robbins, Merrionette Park and nearby in Blue Island. Some even came from as far as Chicago’s North Side.
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Oct 29, 2024 | 
chicagotribune.com | Susan DeGrane
Standing in a field of dry native grasses, Marianne Kozlowski pinches a fluffy spike of Indian grass between her thumb and index finger, then pulls. The plant’s soft seeded bristles fall into her cupped hand before she drops them into a plastic bag. “Touching the tops of Indian grass is like petting a soft kitten,” said Kozlowski, volunteer site steward at Eggers Grove. The Cook County Forest Preserve occupies 240 acres of prairie, woods and wetland on Chicago’s Southeast Side.
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Oct 22, 2024 | 
ecmag.com | Susan DeGrane
Nichola Tesla is said to have been born during a lightning storm in 1856—a circumstance befitting an inventor who would explore the earth’s vast power and magnetism while attempting to develop wireless communication and wireless transmission of electricity. Though Guglielmo Marconi has long been credited with having developed radio, Tesla filed patents for wireless communication seven years earlier.
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Oct 11, 2024 | 
chicagotribune.com | Susan DeGrane
About 50 parishioners from Southland Catholic churches held battery-operated candles Thursday evening while standing beneath a towering statue of Mary at OSF Little Company of Mary Medical Center in Evergreen Park. The observation of Domestic Violence Month included counselors, outreach advocates, nursing educators, nursing students and at least one hospital administrator. They joined in prayers before walking the perimeter of the hospital campus, many wearing shirts and ribbons of purple.
