February 6, 2014 - Major League Soccer (MLS) Vancouver Whitecaps FC CASA GRANDE, ARIZONA - Vancouver Whitecaps FC suffered their first defeat of the preseason by a score of 2-1 to Seattle Sounders FC on Thursday morning at Grande Sports World.

Match highlights and interviews available for download at: https://mlssoccer.box.com/s/a7n2xe5sg6cy6336eh5x

After surrendering two goals in the opening 20 minutes, a second-half surge brought the 'Caps to within one goal of their Cascadia rival but Vancouver's comeback effort would ultimately fall just short.

"There were a lot of positives, but there were also some negatives in regards to what I want and what I demand," said Whitecaps FC head coach Carl Robinson. "I think we had some very good attacking combinations in both halves ... obviously, the defending in the first half for me was nowhere near where it should be. We're looking at certain things and details in collective scenarios. We'll review the video and we'll sit down with the players and move forward."

Second-year winger/striker Erik Hurtado, who came on at halftime, scored Whitecaps FC's lone goal with a stunning half-volley off the run. Less than a minute into the second half, midfielder Matt Watson played a perfect ball over the top to a streaking Hurtado, who hit it first time with the outside of his foot into the top left corner of the goal.

"I think Erik Hurtado's performance in the second half is as good as I've seen since he's been with the club," said Robinson. "He's playing with a spring in his step at the moment. He's got a confidence about him and a desire both on the ball and off the ball as well."

Hurtado, who was playing as the lone central forward, was lively throughout the second half. His best opportunity to equalize came just before the 80-minute mark, when he broke in all alone only to be disrupted by a sliding Marcus Hahnemann.

The 23-year-old also had a few combination plays with Omar Salgado, who played about 30 minutes for the second straight day, but the duo simply couldn't find the back of the net.

Unlike Wednesday's match, in which Robinson fielded a lineup composed mainly of trialists, Residency players, and recent draft picks, the 'Caps went with a more experienced squad against the Sounders on Thursday.

Vancouver's starting lineup included the likes of goalkeeper David Ousted, defender Jay DeMerit and midfielder Nigel Reo-Coker . DeMerit looked particularly sharp in his 45 minutes of action, making no fewer than three sliding clearances in the first half to keep the game within reach.

Link:
Hurtado scores lone Whitecaps FC goal in 2-1 loss to Sounders FC

Another $200,000 is coming down the track for the planned renovations and upgrade to the former Souderton train station.

Construction work at the station, two accompanying buildings and the surrounding parking lot area is expected to begin this year. Last year, the borough began leasing the site from SEPTA. After the upgrade and renovations, the buildings will be subleased to businesses in an economic development move.

On-scene work to design the project started recently.

The engineers are just starting survey work and field measurements, Souderton Borough Manager Mike Coll said.

The winter weather has hampered that work, though, he said.

The snow has been slowing that down quite a bit, he said.

Two grants totaling $1.5 million were previously approved for the train station project.

In November of last year, Coll said the borough had applied for another $200,000 state grant in 2011, but hadnt received a response and assumed it would not get the grant. The Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development had recently contacted him about that grant, though, raising the hope the borough would get the grant, he said.

The state now has approved that grant, Coll said at the Feb. 3 Souderton Borough Council meeting at which the board approved the grant agreement.

This money is for the engineering and design expenses, Coll said. Continued...

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Souderton approved for another grant for train station project

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - Several eastern Iowa school districts held special elections tonight.

Voters in the Clear Creek Amana School District agreed to pay for a fourth elementary school and additions to the middle and high schools. The $48 million bond issue needed 60 percent to pass and received 79 percent, or 989 votes. 268 people voted against the bond.

For a second time Voters said "no" to a new gym in the Williamsburg School District. The $6.7 million proposal needed 60 percent to pass, but only received 56 percent, or 703 votes. 556 people, or 44 percent, voted against the new gymnasium.

Voters approved a school levy in the Central City School District to pay for building projects. The school levy is a PPLE, or physical plant and equipment levy. It needed a simple majority to pass. It passed with 56.7 percent of the vote, or 101 votes. 77 people, or 43 percent, voted against it.

In the North Linn School District, voters failed to pass a PPLE that would have paid for one-to-one computers in the high school, new buses and building upgrades. 58 percent, or 331 people voted against the levy. 236 people or 41.6 percent of voters voted in favor of the levy.

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Voters Approve, Reject Several School District Projects

FROM THE STATES: Mo., Tenn., Calif. evangelism/missions news; 'We have experienced a move of God ... in our church and community'

Today's From the States features items from: The Pathway (Missouri) Baptist & Reflector (Tennessee) California Southern Baptist

Sowing God's Word Transforms Our Communities By Mark Snowden

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (The Pathway) -- Missouri Baptists are being challenged to distribute God's Word this year as they engage the lost in servant evangelism projects. Light Up Missouri is a two-year initiative to transform communities with God's Word through servant evangelism. This is being done in days, seasons and moments of service.

Last year about 35 churches, associations and ministries were recruited to engage in distributing nearly 47,000 "Find it Here" New Testaments in a partnership between the Missouri Baptist Convention and the North American Mission Board.

Look how God moved in these churches. Could He move like this in yours?

"We have experienced a move of God this summer in our church and community," said Norm Howell, pastor of Skyline Baptist Church in Branson. After distributing 1,000 New Testaments within three miles of the church, Skyline had at least 25 additions by statement and baptized 11 adults, two teens and one child. Howell said, "I believe that the scripture distribution and visitation by our members has had a significant role in the new growth within our church."

Tree of Life Church in Kansas City had prayed for 50 souls to be saved, but according to their pastor Jerry Akins, "the Lord sent us 50 more." The church engaged in a season of service in the form of a feeding program last summer. After several days of activities for children in low-income housing, they distributed Bibles. "The gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ was shared," said Akins. "Parents and children began coming to Christ."

St. Joseph Baptist Association took on one of the most aggressive distribution strategies. They sought to distribute 10,000 New Testaments through the summer in various servant evangelism projects in churches. "A pastor had not considered what his church was doing as to being seasons of service," director of missions Clyde Elder reported. "They were just ministering and witnessing to residents of a multi-housing community. So, he incorporated Bible distribution and was excited to see how open people were to taking a Bible and talking about it." Elder says it takes a God-sized vision. "Some of our pastors took a couple of cases of Bibles and came back quickly for more. They underestimated what they could do at different venues."

Kevin Kohler worked with Concord Baptist Association in Jefferson City during a missions project involving 200 students in servant evangelism projects last summer. He said, "New Testaments are important tools. I personally don't care for cold door-knocking. I feel service projects provide a much more personal connection and are a far more important relationship-building process. I love the neighbors to ask us what we are doing."

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February 3, 2014 - Northwoods League (Northwoods) Wisconsin Woodchucks Wausau, WI - The Wisconsin Woodchucks have added two very talented freshman players from national powerhouse program Texas A&M, with the additions of Nick Banks and Kaylor Chafin.

Banks, a 6'0 190 freshman from Tomball, Texas will join the Woodchucks on a full contract following he first year with the Aggies. The left handed hitting outfielder amassed All-District honors all four years, named first team All-American along with first team All-State. He earned Houston Player of the Year Award and Perfect Game All-American and helped his team reach second round playoffs freshman year, first round sophomore year, fourth junior year, and gained title of State Championship during his senior year (2013) Banks batted a .531 senior year with 9 HR, 39 RBI and 42 runs scored.

Chafin, is a left handed pitcher from Sweeny, Texas who will also join the Woodchucks on a full contract following his freshman season at Texas A&M. Chafin was named 2011 District 29 Newcomer of the Year for Brazoria County and 2012 District 20 MVP Brazoria Country Pitcher of the Year, was selected first team All-State pitcher and named second team Utility Player for the Greater Houston Area his junior year (2012), sophomore year, team possessed 8-0 W-L record and he earned a 1.38 Era, .346 AVG, and 112 K's junior year, with a team record of 12-1 W-L, followed by 6-0 W-L senior year. Chafin was a member of the National Honor Society, Student Council, and held the position of Class President for three years.

The Wisconsin Woodchucks are a member of the finest developmental league for elite college baseball players, the Northwoods League. Playing its 21st season of summer collegiate baseball, the Northwoods League is the largest organized baseball league in the world with 18 teams, drawing significantly more fans, in a friendly ballpark experience, than any league of its kind. A valuable training ground for coaches, umpires and front office staff, more than 115 Northwoods League players have advanced to Major League Baseball, including MLB All-Stars Max Scherzer (DET), Chris Sale (CWS), Jordan Zimmermann (WAS), Curtis Granderson (NYY), Allen Craig (STL) and Ben Zobrist (TB). All league games are viewable live and free of charge via the Northwoods League YouTube channel. For more information, visit (www.woodchucks.com).

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Woodchucks Add Two Aggies from Texas A&M

Austin, Texas (PRWEB) January 31, 2014

CDISC is pleased to announce that four highly qualified individuals will add invaluable expertise to the CDISC Board of Directors (BoD) for a three-year term beginning this month (20142017). Dr. Charles Cooper, Dr. Dipak Kalra, Joyce Sensmeier and Nevine Zariffa each contribute unique skillsets to the BoD that will greatly assist CDISC as it moves forward with its Strategic Goals in 2014. Dr. Pierre-Yves Lastic is now the new Chair to the CDISC Board, and Ms. Paula Brown Stafford continues her service to the BoD as Past Chair. Dr. David Hardison was voted Chair-Elect to the Board, and Dr. Kiyoteru Takenouchi was re-elected to serve on the BoD for a second term. Sincere appreciation goes to Dr. Frank Rockhold, Sue Dubman and Dr. Eliot Siegel, who completed their CDISC Board service in December 2013.

Charles Cooper, M.D., is the Medical Director of Becton Dickinson Diagnostics. Prior to this role, Dr. Cooper served as Deputy Director of the Office of Computational Science at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In addition to his experience as a practicing infectious disease physician, Dr. Cooper has a broad range of FDA regulatory expertise, including master level clinical reviewer, co-creator of the Quantitative Safety Division, member of the FDA Genomics Work Group and leader of efforts to create the Computational Science Center. Dr. Cooper received his B.A. from the University of Virginia in 1989, and his M.D. in 1995 from Georgetown University School of Medicine.

Dipak Kalra, Ph.D., is Professor of Health Informatics and Director of the Centre for Health Informatics and Multi-professional Education (CHIME) at University College London. In addition to this role, Dr. Kalra also holds the positions of Honorary Senior Academic General Practitioner at the Whittington Hospital NHS Trust in London, the President of the European Institute for Health Records (EuroRec) Institute, Director of the openEHR Foundation, Editor-in-Chief of the AMIA Standards Standard, and Consultant and Advisor on semantic interoperability to the European Commission, English National Health Service, Ministry of Health in Singapore and Ministry of Health in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Joyce Sensmeier, M.S., R.N., is the Vice President of Informatics at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). She has made contributions to enabling health information exchange through standards profiling, testing and harmonization initiatives. Ms. Sensmeier led the advancement of and currently serves as President of Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) USA. IHE USA is a regional deployment committee of IHE International, a standards profiling organization, which over the past decade has achieved both national and international adoption of its public domain technical framework. Ms. Sensmeier is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing, and has led consortia that include industry, government and clinical leaders in efforts to advance widespread adoption of interoperable electronic health records.

Nvine Zariffa, M. Math, is Vice President of Biometrics and Information Sciences at AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals. Prior to this role, she held a number of positions at GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals across all phases of drug development. Ms. Zariffa is a pharmaceutical executive with 20 years experience across all phases of drug development. She is an expert in statistics, drug development, portfolio-level decisions, regulatory interactions, strategy, innovation, bridging the discovery/development interface, and business development. Ms. Zariffa received her B.S. in Mathematics from McGill University in 1987, and her M. Math from the University of Waterloo in 1988.

We are honored to have such an excellent group of experienced professionals join the CDISC Board of Directors. Their backgrounds and expertise will enhance the current Board, ensuring that we continue to work toward realizing the CDISC Strategic Goals over the next three years, said Dr. Pierre-Yves Lastic, current Chair of the CDISC Board of Directors.

Continuing members of the CDISC Board of Directors, in addition to new members mentioned above are: Dr. Pierre-Yves Lastic, Sanofi (Chair); Paula Brown Stafford, Quintiles (Past Chair); Dr. David Hardison, Recombinant by Deloitte (Chair-Elect); Michael Glickman, Computer Network Architects; David Handelsman, SAS; Dr. Rebecca Kush, CDISC; Wayne Kubick, CDISC; Dr. Douglas Peddicord, ACRO; Stephen Pyke, GlaxoSmithKline; John Speakman, NYU Langone Medical Center; and Dr. Kiyoteru Takenouchi, Medical Front Corporation.

ABOUT CDISC CDISC is a 501(c)(3) global non-profit charitable organization, with over 300 supporting member organizations from across the clinical research and healthcare arenas. Through the efforts of volunteers around the globe, CDISC catalyzes productive collaboration to develop industry-wide data standards enabling the harmonization of clinical data and streamlining research processes from protocol through analysis and reporting, including the use of electronic health records to facilitate the collection of high quality research data. The CDISC standards and innovations can decrease the time and cost of medical research and improve quality, thus contributing to the faster development of safer and more effective medical products and a learning healthcare system. The CDISC Vision is to inform patient care and safety through higher quality medical research.

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CDISC Announces New Additions to Board of Directors for 2014

January 30, 2014 - Indoor Football League (IFL) Sioux Falls Storm The Sioux Falls Storm and Head Coach Kurtiss Riggs are proud to announce the coaching staff for the 2014 season. Three of the four positions will feature coaches new to their role, but certainly not new to the Storm Organization. Long-time defensive lineman, Rachman Crable, and former defensive back and coach, Andre Fields will be joining the Storm's coaching ranks as defensive line coach and defensive backs/special teams coach, respectively. Former coach, Brian Hermanson, returns as defensive coordinator and former offensive lineman, Paul Keizer returns for his 5th season on the Storm sidelines. All four coaches carry impressive football resumes.

PAUL KEIZER

Offensive Line Coach- 5th Season

Paul Keizer will be entering his fifth season on the Storm coaching staff. Keizer, a former two-time all-star, played for Sioux Falls in 2007 and 2008. During Keizer's career, the Storm allowed only 18 sacks on 836 passing attempts. The Storm offensive line, led by Keizer, set a team record in rushing yards and total points during the 2007 season.

Keizer, a South Dakota State University alum, is currently a trainer at the Sanford POWER facility. He and his wife, April, live in Sioux Falls with their two children.

RACHMAN CRABLE

Defensive Line Coach- 1st Season

Rachman Crable returns to the Sioux Falls Storm in a new role. He will serve as the defensive line coach for the 2014 season. Crable played six seasons for the Storm recording 222 total tackles, 88.5 tackles for loss, 37 sacks, 9 forced fumbles and 12 blocked kicks. Having played for three other teams, Crable brings over 10 years of indoor experience to the coaching staff.

Crable is a graduate of Ball State University. He is currently living and working in Sioux Falls with his fiancee, Olympia Scott, and their two children.

Brian Hermanson

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Familiar Faces in Storm Coaching Staff Additions

The adjective surreal has, over time, come to mean unfathomable or not of this world or just really, really freaky. But its worth noting that the early surrealist writers werent interested in summoning strangeness for strangenesss sake. Their goal was rather to discomfit readers in the way that our most vivid dreams do, through the juxtaposition of realistic yet unrelated images: two realities, more or less distant, brought together, in the words of poet Pierre Reverdy.

The best stories in Ben Marcuss new collection of short fiction, Leaving the Sea, are surreal in this original sense of the word. They seem powered by the electrostatic charge that results whenever the texture of the familiar is abraded by some alien, highly resistant material. These 15 tales are by turns tender, funny, heartbreaking, frightening and occasionally overweening. But even when hes overestimating his readers patience or fortitude, Marcus is nothing less than fully engaged in an artistic enterprise that the surrealists would have authorized: injecting into our recognizable world just enough weirdness to make readers second-guess their senses.

(Knopf) - Leaving the Sea, by Ben Marcus

Snow wreaks havoc across the South, Syrian army nears Aleppo, rare white lion born in Poland, and more.

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This destabilizing weirdness starts off subtly in the opening story, What Have You Done? So invested are we in tracking the shaky progress of an ill-tempered man who has reluctantly returned home for a family reunion that it almost slips right by us when he pauses to regard the newest architectural additions to the downtown Cleveland skyline: They were tall and thin and black, hooked at their tops, and were either sheathed entirely in charcoal-tinted glass or simply windowless.

Even those who dont think to scribble a question mark in the margin after reading that sentence may wonder whether theres some sort of connection between those hellish, hook-topped skyscrapers and the middle-of-the-night knock at the door that resonates throughout the next story. I Can Say Many Nice Things begins as wry, spot-on satire. Its setting is a creative-writing seminar offered to (hilariously untalented) cruise-ship passengers as an edifying onboard activity. But mid-story, a crew member begins barging in on sleeping passengers to check them against the ships manifest, without explaining why. After this point, Marcuss straightforward narrative sensibility begins tacking toward the mysterious Don DeLillo Islands, where paranoia reigns supreme and light humor goes to harden.

If these details sound more at home in dystopian sci-fi than in a pair of otherwise naturalistic short stories set in present-day Cleveland and aboard a tacky cruise ship, theyre only the first of many such dissonant chords Marcus strikes. Indeed, as we make our way through this collection, we may feel as if were moving gradually through a dark chronology of Americas imminent social and political unraveling. And though theres nothing to indicate that these texts are linked schematically, its hard not to register them as creepy snapshots from some pre-apocalyptic Instagram feed.

By the time we reach the books midpoint, the seeds of dread that Marcus has planted early on have blossomed into full-blown fleurs du mal. Weve encountered the sad-sack protagonist of Rollingwood, whose string of personal misfortunes is so devastatingly complete that it almost suggests a memo has gone out to his ex-girlfriend, his boss, the people in his carpool, even his sickly child, declaring him anathema. And weve had time to process the pair of brief Q&A-style interviews with two highly educated, supremely self-satisfied sociopaths who justify their withdrawal from humanity by quoting radical social theorists and couching their monstrousness in magazine-ready pull-quotes. (To me its beautiful that our survival strategies are wonderfully diverse and not all of us can succeed.)

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Leaving the Sea, 15 new stories by Ben Marcus

We got a list of part of the SXSW premiere lineup of films not long ago, with Veronica Mars and Jon Favreaus Chef announced as the fests first wave of films. Now weve got most of the rest of the festivals lineup. The midnight selections and some inevitable late-breaking additions are still to be announced, but this should be more than enough to get potential attendees excited about the 2014 lineup.

SXSW will feature the premiere of Nacho Vigalondos Open Windows (above),as well as the feature Faults from Riley Stearns, who directed the great short film The Cub. (Faults features Mary Elizabeth Winstead in the lead in a story about cult brainwashing and deprogramming.) Theres also a great set of films imported from Sundance, including Richard Linklaters Boyhood, which only played twice in Park City, and films such as The Raid 2 and Frank, the latter of which features sequences shot at last years SXSW.

Check out the full lineup below.

NARRATIVE FEATURE COMPETITION

Eight world premieres, eight unique ways to celebrate the art of storytelling. Selected from 1,324 films submitted to SXSW 2014. Films screening in Narrative Feature Competition are:

10,000KM(Spain) Director: Carlos Marques Marcet, Screenwriters: Carlos Marques-Marcet, Clara Roquet Autonell A year of a long distance relationship, two computers and two cities Los Angeles and Barcelona, can love survive 6,000 miles? Cast: Natalia Tena, David Verdaguer(World Premiere)

Animals Director: Collin Schiffli, Screenwriter: David Dastmalchian Jude and Bobbie are a young, homeless couple who masterfully con and steal in an attempt to stay one step ahead of their addiction. They are ultimately forced to face the reality of their situation when one of them is hospitalized. Cast: David Dastmalchian, Kim Shaw, John Heard (World Premiere)

Before I Disappear Director/Screenwriter: Shawn Christensen Based on the 2013 Academy Award winning short filmCurfew. At the lowest point of his life, Richie gets a call from his estranged sister, asking him to look after his eleven-year-old niece, Sophia, for a few hours. Cast: Shawn Christensen, Fatima Ptacek, Emmy Rossum, Paul Wesley, Ron Perlman, Richard Schiff (World Premiere)

Fort Tilden Directors/Screenwriters: Sarah-Violet Bliss, Charles Rogers It shouldnt be this hard for Allie and Harper to get to the beach. Cast: Bridey Elliott, Clare McNulty, Griffin Newman, Jeffrey Scaperrotta, Neil Casey (World Premiere)

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SXSW Film Program Features Boyhood, Open Windows, and Faults

January 29, 2014 - Northwoods League (Northwoods) Wisconsin Woodchucks Wausau, WIS. - With Opening Day less then four months away, the Wisconsin Woodchucks have announced their first two roster additions to the 2014 season in the newly renovated Athletic Park. The Woodchucks will continue the tradition of University of Arkansas baseball players playing in Wausau with the addition of left handed pitcher Zach Barr and right handed pitcher Alex Phillips. The University of Arkansas baseball team is ranked 25th in the Baseball America preseason rankings after coming off there 12th year advancing to the NCAA Tournament.

Alex Phillips is freshman from Nacogdoches, Texas. The righthander was ranked in the top 500 recruits nationally and the 57th-best recruit in the state of Texas in the class of 2013 by Perfect Game ... Named to 2012 Perfect Game preseason underclassmen All-American high honorable mention team ... Selected first-team all-state as a junior and second-team all-state as a sophomore ... Named to the state tournament all-tournament team as a sophomore ... Has a 22-2 career record with a 1.28 ERA and 238 strikeouts in 159 innings pitched in his high school career ... Posted a 10-1 record with a 1.22 ERA as a junior and a 12-1 record with a 1.35 ERA as a sophomore ... At the plate, hit .417 with three homers and 21 RBI as a sophomore and .351 with six home runs and 40 RBI as a junior.

Zach Barr is a 6'3, 200 junior transfer from the University of Central Arkansas who Pitched in 13 games, 10 out of the bullpen, and had a 2-0 record with a 3.38 ERA as a sophomore in 2013 ... Allowed only 12 hits in 16 innings of work, holding opponents to a .203 batting average ... Pitched in nine games, including one start, as a freshman in 2012 and compiled a 1-0 record with a 1.84 ERA ... Averaged more than a strikeout an inning, fanning 15 in 14.2 innings.

The Wisconsin Woodchucks are a member of the finest developmental league for elite college baseball players, the Northwoods League. Playing its 21st season of summer collegiate baseball, the Northwoods League is the largest organized baseball league in the world with 18 teams, drawing significantly more fans, in a friendly ballpark experience, than any league of its kind. A valuable training ground for coaches, umpires and front office staff, more than 115 Northwoods League players have advanced to Major League Baseball, including MLB All-Stars Max Scherzer (DET), Chris Sale (CWS), Jordan Zimmermann (WAS), Curtis Granderson (NYY), Allen Craig (STL) and Ben Zobrist (TB). All league games are viewable live and free of charge via the Northwoods League YouTube channel. For more information, visit (NWL team website) (www.woodchucks.com).

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Woodchucks Announce First 2014 Roster Additions