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A new federal lawsuit in Maryland is challenging a Trump administration memo giving the nation’s schools and universities two weeks to eliminate “race-based” practices of any kind or risk losing their federal money.The lawsuit, filed Tuesday by the American Federation of Teachers union and the American Sociological Association, says the Education Department’s February 14 memo violates the First and Fifth Amendments. Forcing schools to teach only the views supported by the federal government amounts to a violation of free speech, the organizations say, and the directive is so vague that schools don’t know what practices cross the line.“This letter radically upends and re-writes otherwise well-established jurisprudence,” the lawsuit said. “No federal law prevents teaching about race and race-related topics, and the Supreme Court has not banned efforts to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in education.”The memo, formally known as a Dear Colleague Letter, orders schools and universities to stop any practice that treats people differently because of their race, giving a deadline of this Friday. As a justification, it cites a Supreme Court decision banning the use of race in college admissions, saying the ruling applies more broadly to all federally funded education.President Donald Trump’s administration is aiming to end what the memo described as widespread discrimination in education, often against white and Asian American students.At stake is a sweeping expansion of the Supreme Court ruling, which focused on college admissions policies that considered race as a factor when admitting students. In the February 14 memo, the Education Department said it interprets the ruling to apply to admissions, hiring, financial aid, graduation ceremonies, and “all other aspects of student, academic and campus life.”The lawsuit says the Education Department is applying the Supreme Court decision too broadly and overstepping the agency’s authority. It takes issue with a line in the memo condemning teaching about “systemic and structural racism.”“It is not clear how a school could teach a fulsome U.S. History course without teaching about slavery, the Missouri Compromise, the Emancipation Proclamation, the forced relocation of Native American tribes,” and other lessons that might run afoul of the letter, the lawsuit said.The department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.In the memo, Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights, had said schools’ and colleges diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts have been “smuggling racial stereotypes and explicit race-consciousness into everyday training, programming, and discipline.“But under any banner, discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin is, has been, and will continue to be illegal,” Trainor wrote in the memo.The lawsuit argues the Dear Colleague Letter is so broad that it appears to forbid voluntary student groups based on race or background, including Black student unions or Irish-American heritage groups. The memo also appears to ban college admissions practices that weren’t outlawed in the Supreme Court decision, including recruiting efforts to attract students of all races, the lawsuit said.It asks the court to stop the department from enforcing the memo and strike it down.The American Federation of Teachers is one of the nation’s largest teachers unions. The sociological association is a group of about 9,000 college students, scholars and teachers. Both groups say their members teach lessons and supervise student organizations that could jeopardize their schools’ federal money under the memo. The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. Collin Binkley, AP Education Writer
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The World Health Organization (WHO) has confirmed that a worrying mystery illness is spreading in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The unknown disease has so far sickened hundreds and killed dozens since reports of it first emerged in early January. Heres what to know about the outbreaks so far. What is the disease? At this time, health officials do not know what the disease is. In the WHO’s weekly bulletin for the February 10- 16 period, the agency says the unknown disease poses a significant public health threat. The disease is currently active in two regional clusters, according to the report, and worryingly, of those who have died from it, nearly half of the deaths happened within just 48 hours of symptoms emerging. The first regional cluster where the disease made itself known is in the Boloko Village, in the Bolomba Health Zone region of the DRC. In that village, three children reportedly died from the disease between January 10-13. Then in early February, the disease reportedly spread to its second regional cluster in Bomate Village, Basankusu Health Zone, located in the northwest of the DRC. Initially, there were 20 reported deaths from the disease there between January 30 and February 9. As Reuters reports, WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic told a briefing on Tuesday that “The outbreaks, which have seen cases rise rapidly within days, pose a significant public health threat. The exact cause remains unknown. How many people have died or become sick? Unfortunately, health authorities now say that both the number of cases and the number of deaths have risen sharply since the first initial reports came in for both outbreak clusters. WHO says that as of February 15, a total of 431 people have become sick across both clusters. In total, there have been 53 known deaths from the illness. That represents a case fatality rate (CFR) of 12.2%. When breaking down the illnesses and deaths by regional clusters, 12 cases and 8 deaths have occurred in the Bolomba Health Zone, where the disease was first reported. That means that in that single zone, the disease has a case fatality rate of 66.7%. But it is the second cluster, in the Basankusu Health Zone, where the majority of cases and deaths have occurred. In the Basankusu Health Zone, there have been 419 cases with 45 deaths, representing a case fatality rate of 10.7%. How far has the disease spread? As of the WHOs bulletin, the unknown disease has only been reported in the Bolomba Health Zone and Basankusu Health Zone in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The two areas are relatively close to each other and are located in the northwestern portion of the country. Currently, the disease is not reported to have spread to any other areas of the DRC or neighboring countries How does the disease spread? It is currently unknown how the disease spreads. Health authorities have reported that trace-back data shows the outbreak is thought to have first happened in the Bolomba Health Zone. Multiple children became sick with the disease. According to WHO, Reports indicate that the children had consumed a bat carcass prior to onset of signs and symptom.” This suggests that the disease may be spread by the consumption of animals that are harboring it, but this is not a certainty. It is unknown if researchers have discovered a direct link between bat consumption and the outbreak of the disease. Diseases can also have multiple routes of transmission. What are the symptoms of the disease? The WHOs bulletin states that the children who first came down with symptoms after eating the bat suffered from the following: fever headache diarrhoea fatigue Those symptoms later transitioned into: subconjunctival haemorrhage epistaxis haematemesis However, the range of symptoms across all cases is more broad. Health authorities say infected persons may produce a number of symptoms, including: fever chills headache myalgia body aches sweating rhinorrhea neck stiffness cough vomiting diarrhoea abdominal cramps Could this be the start of another pandemic? It is much too early to say whether the mystery illness that has broken out in the DRC could be the beginning of the next pandemic. Health authorities simply know too little about the disease and how it spreads at this time. However, its worth noting that in December, there were reports of another mystery illness in the DRC, and that disease was later found out to be severe malaria, reported Reuters. In other words, just because the disease is a mystery right now, doesnt mean it’s not simply an existing illness that health officials have previously identified. However, WHO does say that tests have ruled out other diseases, including Ebola and Marburg. The exclusion of these diseases raises concerns about a severe infectious or toxic agent being behind the as-of-yet-unknown disease. Other possibilities for the mystery disease include malaria, viral haemorrhagicfever, food or water poisoning, typhoid fever, and meningitis, according to WHO. Or it could turn out to be something totally new. For now, health authorities simply need more time to determine what it is.
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Want more housing market stories from Lance Lamberts ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. Total active U.S. housing inventory for sale recently fell by 42,133 homes, from 871,509 in December 2024 to 829,376 in January 2025, according to the latest Realtor.com data. Historically, national active inventory usually declines during this seasonal month-over-month window, with the average decline since 2017 being -69,646 between December and January. The fact that inventory is rising year-over-year, combined with January’s smallest inventory decline for the month since Realtor.com began publishing data in summer 2016, strongly suggests that national active housing inventory for sale is likely to end the year higher. Heading into 2025, the average forecast model tracked by ResiClub projected U.S. active inventory for sale to increase by 12.5% in 2025. Through the end of January 2025, active inventory is growing at a rate of 25% on a year-over-year basis. In markets that maintain this (or greater) level of inventory growth, homebuyers will gain more leverage and power. Some markets that are sellers markets could become balanced markets, and some markets that are balanced markets could become buyers markets. Historically speaking, national active inventory usually begins its seasonal decline around August, and then begins to rise again around March. (Note: The seasonal cycle for new listings is a little different; it usually begins to rise around January and tops out around June.) While national active inventory is rising (+25% on a year-over-year basis), national active inventory at the end of January 2025 (829,376) was still 25% below pre-pandemic January 2019 levels (1,110,636). And that story varies a lot by market. The Northeast and Midwest remain fairly tight, while the Gulf region has softened. !function(){"use strict";window.addEventListener("message",(function(a){if(void 0!==a.data["datawrapper-height"]){var e=document.querySelectorAll("iframe");for(var t in a.data["datawrapper-height"])for(var r=0;r
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