Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

Reading Time: 14 minutes Editor’s note: This story was produced with financial support from the Education Writers Association’s Reporting Fellowship program. Click here to read highlights from the story Wisconsin’s 2024 Wisconsin Guarantee law automatically admits students in the top 5% of their high school class to UW-Madison and top 10% to other UW campuses if they apply by the required deadlines. Early evidence suggests the program has had little effect on who applies to or enrolls at UW-Madison, despite reducing admissions anxiety for some students. An unpublished UW-Madison study estimates 95% of students admitted through the Wisconsin Guarantee would…

The ideas that Neets (young people not in education, employment or training) simply aren’t trying hard enough to find a job, or don’t want one, are “myths,” Alan Milburn wrote in his interim report on the subject earlier this year – “sometimes cruel ones”. Although 84% of Neets say they want to work, their prospects are unfairly limited by where they live. Rotherham has one suitable vacancy for every 22 young adults. The Cotswolds has one for every four. For too many young people, particularly those in deprived parts of Britain, there simply aren’t enough jobs.This is the finding from…

US President Donald Trump said Friday that his eldest son had reimbursed a Kremlin-linked Russian businessman who paid for two days of wedding celebrations in the Bahamas in May. Donald Trump Jr. and Bettina Trump confirmed on Monday that their “dear friend” Umar Kremlev “very generously hosted two incredible nights”. The lavish gift sparked questions about ethics and foreign influence. “It’s totally allowed but as I understand it, he paid him back,” Trump said when an AFP reporter asked him in the Oval Office if it had been appropriate for his son to accept the gift. “I guess a friend…

Michael Marra has been elected as the new leader of the Scottish Labour party, winning almost two-thirds of the vote to lead the party in Holyrood.The MSP for North East Scotland is Scottish Labour’s 11th leader, replacing Anas Sarwar after his shock decision to resign in July to join Andy Burnham’s new government as a trade minister.In his acceptance speech, Marra said he would spend time reconnecting with Scottish voters. “May hurt so much because we know the SNP didn’t deserve a fifth term in power. But the truth is Scotland didn’t think we would be much better.“Scots know what…

The FCC has announced it’s waiving its rules limiting foreign equity ownership to 25 percent in the Paramount-Warner Bros. case and will allow three sovereign wealth funds run by the governments of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi to own 49.5 percent of the company.During Brendan Carr’s tenure, the FCC has repeatedly threatened ABC, tried to block stations from airing interviews with Democrats, censored late-night TV hosts, and tried to bully journalists. However, it seems to have no qualms with repressive foreign governments owning a significant stake in a giant American media conglomerate.In its ruling, the FCC defended the decision,…

Meta has released Muse for Mac, the first version of Muse that can complete things on a user’s computer. The agent works with local files and native apps, where your data already lives. It adds a desktop layer to an agent that launched on phones, the web and WhatsApp earlier this month. Is it deployable? Yes, for end users. It is a free macOS download today, only available in the US for now. It is a hosted consumer agent, not an open model you can self-host. Mark Zuckerberg announced the Mac app on X, noting that it works across apps,…

Customer engagement platform Brevo fell victim to a supply chain attack that resulted in malicious code being injected into over 100,000 websites. Brevo was initially hacked on September 10, when a threat actor exploited a vulnerability in Brevo’s handling of SAML SSO to access 138 accounts, including one belonging to cryptocurrency storage provider Trezor. The attackers sent phishing emails from six of the accounts and exported the contacts of 43 accounts, Brevo said in an incident notice. The company closed the unauthorized access, but the attackers returned on September 14, when they used a compromised long-lived Cloudflare API key to…

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde stopped Binance from operating in the European Union, according to a Wall Street Journal report.  The newspaper on Thursday reported that the top crypto exchange was on the cusp of operating in the trading bloc but then was told it couldn’t after the central bank chief waded in.  EU law requires that local Crypto-Asset Service Providers (CASP) have a MiCA license. Binance does not. Binance in June withdrew its MiCA application in Greece.  “Lagarde wanted to keep the controversial crypto exchange, which pleaded guilty to financial-crime violations in the U.S., out of the European…

The German government has agreed to tax reductions that will cut gasoline prices by €0.17 ($0.1952) ​a litre in response to soaring fuel prices, people with knowledge of the matter said on Friday. The move includes a €0.14 cut in the energy tax and an additional €0.03 cut from ​the sales ‌tax, the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said. The ⁠decision came after Chancellor Friedrich Merz promised this week to offer relief to consumers hit by soaring gasoline prices. ‌It followed extended negotiations between the federal government and state governments over ⁠how to finance the cuts. As the…

BERLIN – Die schwarz-rote Koalition hat sich mit den Ländern grundsätzlich auf ein Maßnahmenpaket zur Entlastung von Bürgern und Unternehmen angesichts der hohen Spritpreise verständigt. Vorgesehen sind ein neuer Tankrabatt und ein krisenbedingter Spritpreisdeckel. POLITICO liegt das Beschlusspapier vor. Es sieht eine Entlastung von Bürgern sowie Unternehmen in Höhe von rund 2,5 Milliarden Euro vor. Konkret soll die Energiesteuer auf Benzin und Diesel bis Ende 2026 um 14 Cent je Liter gesenkt werden. Zusammen mit der Umsatzsteuer ergibt sich daraus eine Entlastung von 17 Cent je Liter. „Bund und Länder werden die Bürgerinnen und Bürger sowie die Unternehmen angesichts der…