Latest news with #Boswell
USA Today
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- USA Today
Steelers legend James Harrison's wild interaction with K Chris Boswell resurfaces
A hilarious and frightening interaction between Steelers kicker Chris Boswell and legend James Harrison has begun to resurface and make waves on social media. The viral story in question is from a January episode of The Christian Kuntz Podcast, where Boswell revealed how his first interactions with Harrison went. "I got to go home for the weekend and come back, and Deebo, my very first practice, stood over the holder," Boswell said. "So the holder's waiting to get a snap, standing over his shoulder, and [James Harrison says], 'I dare you to miss this kick. I dare you to miss it. You miss this kick, you wash my back in the shower.' "Even after, I obviously had a decent season that year, but team meeting room, when I used to go, I would sit here and Deebo would sit here — and he would just stare at me. Mike Tomlin's up there, giving his team presentation, and he's just staring at me like this the entire meeting. Just intimidating." As hilarious as Boswell's retelling of the story was, he admitted that the Steelers' kicking woes likely painted the positional group in a bad light — clearly in the crosshairs of Harrison, where no sane man wants to be. Harrison's intimidation may have helped create one of the best to ever do it, as Boswell has an opportunity to become the most accurate kicker in NFL history this season — just 1.1% behind former Ravens K Justin Tucker's 89.1% all-time record. For up-to-date Steelers coverage, follow us on X @TheSteelersWire and give our Facebook page a like.
Scoop
08-07-2025
- General
- Scoop
A Tale Of Two Stopbanks Hemming In Wairau River
When Marlborough District Council's chief executive was confronted by a frustrated Spring Creek resident last weekend, the collective anxieties of a whole community was laid at his door. At the time John Boswell took it in stride. 'Look, his house is threatened,' Boswell told Local Democracy Reporting after the resident left. 'You can understand the person, like, I get it.' The resident was not alone in his dissatisfaction with council. Nearly every Spring Creek resident who spoke to LDR voiced the same grievance. 'They should have sorted it out yesterday,' one resident said, standing next to a water pump. 'We expected council would start the works when they said they would,' said another. Each frustrated sentiment was underpinned by a single question. Where were the promised Wairau River stopbank repairs? And why had they been delayed? In 2024, council set aside $8.7 million in their Long Term Plan to strengthen the stopbank after it was compromised following the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake. That included $3.6m in government funding. Work was to begin at the end of 2024, but was delayed by about a year to the start of 2026, with work to be completed by June 2027. That delay left residents, who had already been flooded for three of the past four years, with another year at risk of flooding. Speaking last week, Boswell said rebuilding a stopbank from scratch was no easy task, and required time to get it right. 'You can't just repair a stopbank overnight,' he said. 'It takes time, and because of the type of events that we experienced at the weekend, they're going to have to do it in the summer.' Boswell said the delay was caused by a combination of design finalising, funding and material sourcing, and works on the northern side of the Wairau River. 'There was work done on the northern side in terms of clearing out some vegetation, and widening the river [to take] the pressure off the southern bank, which worked really well during [last weekend's] event. 'And then we went through the design process, sourcing the funding, getting the materials, and so on. 'They're working bloody hard to do it as quickly as they can.' At least 35,000 tonnes of rock would be needed for the job, the council said last year. Most of that was expected to come from the nearby Pukaka Quarry. Boswell said council had long communicated with the Spring Creek community about the complexities of rebuilding a stopbank. 'One of the first things I walked in on when I came to this job was a meeting in the hall at Spring Creek, where our rivers engineers team talked the community through the issue, what the potential fix looked like, and the time frame for that fix,' Boswell said. 'Since that meeting, they've worked bloody hard to get the design confirmed, to source the money from government, to think about where they're going to source the materials and how they're going to pre-position them.' Concerns about how the stopbank would perform when put under stress caused council to issue a precautionary 24-hour evacuation for 60 households in Spring Creek on June 27. But Boswell said that stopbank actually performed better than they thought during the rainfall. 'The bank itself held up really, really well ... it was performing exactly as we hoped it would,' Boswell said. 'Once the river level started to drop, and we could see that the integrity of it still was there, then we were able to let the residents back in.' Boswell said he stood by the decision to evacuate residents. 'When it comes to risking someone's life versus their property, then we'll always err on the side of caution, and that's what we did on this particular occasion,' he said. Boswell said the water that covered parts of the township was surface flooding, not due to a stopbank breach. 'The surface flooding was as a result of stormwater coming in across the paddock to the west of the Spring Creek settlement,' he said. 'On this particular occasion it resulted in a low, although incredibly annoying, level of stormwater or flooding for the local residents. 'But it certainly wasn't life threatening to the same extent as if there had been a [stop bank] breach.' Boswell said the council was also hard at work identifying and repairing faults in the stopbank at the confluence of the Wairau and Waihopai rivers. The council issued a 'be ready to leave' order on June 27 that led many Renwick residents to self-evacuate. Boswell said it was a very close call for Renwick residents. 'During [a routine] check, it was found what appeared to be seepage through a stopbank on the Waihopai River, which if compromised could have impacted on lower Renwick,' Boswell said. Boswell said that if the bank had been breached they would have had less than an hour to fully evacuate lower Renwick. 'We thought that was enough time if people have been pre-warned, to get them out if we needed to. 'We had a trigger point for when we were going to order an evacuation. 'We didn't quite get there, so we didn't have to do it.' Council staff would be out in Renwick identifying any more weaknesses in that stopbank. 'We're going to do whatever we can to ensure the integrity of that stopbank, should there be another event,' Boswell said. 'Then we're going to look at the wider scheme just to make sure that we've got everything.'
Scoop
08-07-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Council Publishes 2025 Pre Election Report
Marlborough District Council has published its 2025 Pre Election Report to provide information for voters and potential candidates about Council's finances, major projects and key challenges. The report is required under legislation and designed to help promote public discussion about the issues facing Council and to encourage informed debate in the lead-up to the October 2025 local government elections. It includes demographic information about the province, a list of Council's major projects over the next three years, a financial overview and the outlook for Council from the perspective of Chief Executive John Boswell. 'The key challenges ahead include the creation of a new water services organisation, the new ferries replacement project, the Government's legislative reforms and how we plan to manage and respond to the impacts of climate change,' Mr Boswell said. 'Local government is a complex and challenging environment that requires both a strategic understanding of what's important to those who work at the political and strategic level, as well as a deep understanding of what matters most to the community it serves. 'The coming Council term - October 2025 to October 2028 - promises to be a period of both opportunity and challenge as a number of Government reform proposals are likely to be either finalised or enacted, decisions regarding key infrastructure projects are made, and a range of key community initiatives are progressed. A new Long Term Plan will be progressed with a full public consultation expected in early 2027. 'The development of a strong new councillor team is crucial to ensuring that Marlborough not only continues to provide the best possible service to our community but looks to how we can best position our district for the future,' he said.
Chicago Tribune
30-06-2025
- Science
- Chicago Tribune
South, southwest suburban high school districts prepare to implement new AI programs
South and southwest suburban school districts are using the summer to prepare to implement several artificial intelligence tools, training or guidelines in the classroom, embracing the technology as it becomes harder to outright ban it. Several high school districts, including Orland High District 230, Bremen District 228 and Oak Lawn District 229, have expanded technology committees and implemented guidelines on AI in discipline codes, giving teachers autonomy to use AI but prohibiting certain uses, such as generating content. 'Because it's been embedded in so many programs now, we had to come up with a clause in our policy that actually covers that. I mean, AI is just everywhere,' said Marcus Wargin, assistant principal at Oak Lawn Community High School. 'We knew we didn't want to say no to AI, so we just wanted to put some guardrails in place.' District 228 has experimented with AI and recently purchased several programs to launch this fall. One AI program, entitled and founded in 2023, helps teachers convert class content to different languages, reading levels and content that is more closely related to the students interests, which 'makes a big difference,' said Jim Boswell, director of operations and technology. The district also plans to pilot the AI program Magic School, which gives students access to tools for reviewing and brainstorming ideas while ensuring the teacher has control over access to the tools. Students can even chat with an AI version of Abraham Lincoln, Boswell said. 'It comes down to taking off some of the tasks that get in the way of teachers interacting with their students, and we really do believe at a core level that AI is going to allow our teachers to be more in touch with their students, or be able to help their students more, rather than less, because it's going to eliminate things that are taking time away from students,' Boswell said. At the administrative level, District 228 is using AI licensing for general data analysis, such as student performance, 'turning hours of work into seconds,' said Boswell. He said staff is trained to fact check and edit the information. Oak Lawn High School has already allowed teachers and students to use AI technology for school projects that went well last spring, according to Wargin. Students used Chat GPT to research how Oak Lawn could build a healthier, more sustainable food culture while other students used AI to manipulate their own pictures in a photography class, which taught students to 'ask what was ethical,' he said. District 229 also required mandatory staff training on AI use, along with integrating AI education to students on a 'grand scale,' incorporating it into the media center's training for freshmen and other classes, Wargin said. This coming year, Wargin said the district plans to educate students on the ethical use of AI, along with how to prompt it and understand if data is accurate. The use of AI could also vary from teacher to teacher, Wargin said, as long as student data is protected and students are still generating their own original ideas. John Connolly, District 230 chief technology & operations officer and a board member for the Illinois Educational Technology Leaders, said schools have rescinded bans on AI because even if the technology is blocked from a school's online network, students and staff are still able to access it on their phones and personal devices. District 230 decided against purchasing any specific AI programs and instead plans to continue exploring options and increasing training, Connolly said. 'The technology is moving so fast and there are so many things being introduced on the AI front, so that's why we're in an exploratory stage where we're seeing how all these technologies are coming along and how they can be used,' he said. Since about two years ago, Connolly said, teachers have faced an explosive prevalence of AI in the classroom. Sheli Thoss, an English teacher at Stagg High School entering her 34th year of instruction, said she increased the number of in-class and hand-written assignments to avoid opportunities for the use of AI and also to get to know individual student voices. 'Obviously we don't want AI to do students' thinking and that's kind of the catch is like, there are very appropriate uses for it and there are very inappropriate uses for it, so we have to kind of find that balance,' Thoss said. Thoss said she's discovered several students using AI to write assignments, but in response gives those students an opportunity to redo the assignment in front of her. She also addresses the issue individually, a method she has found particularly effective. 'It's just a matter of reminding kids that you believe that they can do it, that you know they have the skills to do it and making sure as well that if they're not, asking them what's going on and why they're making this choice,' Thoss said. 'I've found in my own opinion that when you address it and catch it one time and handle it with some kind of kindness and an opportunity to redo it, that they don't do it again,' she said. District 230 held its first large-scale AI training in March for more than 75 teachers and staff. Attendees spent three hours discussing how to leverage AI, along with the pros and cons of using the technology. The district also added guidelines on the use of AI to its discipline policy for the first time last summer. Connolly said while the district has not purchased any AI-specific programs for the classroom, the district made data privacy agreements with companies they had already partnered with as the companies embed AI into existing programs, such as Microsoft's Copilot or Google's Gemini. The district also embraced the use of AI for the district's wireless system in 2022 through a company called Juniper, which helps the district better manage the efficiency of its network. District 230 might reevaluate its stance next year, Connolly said, after using this year to explore different uses and types of AI tools in the classroom. 'It's going to be really interesting to see some of our existing applications, how they build AI within them, to take them to the next level and a lot of those are instructional tools,' Connolly said. 'It's also really important for us to work with our teachers on this to make sure that we're supporting what our teachers need.' Both Bremen's Boswell and Oak Lawn's Wargin said while there have been some concerns around the ethics of using AI, teacher feedback has been generally positive about its efficiency. 'We have a good vibe going amongst our staff about the use of AI and its potential,' Boswell said. 'This next school year is getting the rubber to the road and being able to get teachers trained, developing student literacy for AI.' Several districts plan to communicate about the effectiveness of each program, essentially collaborating through 'group sourcing' to find the best resources, Boswell said. 'I have friends or colleagues in every department in every district near us, and some are trying different tools than us, and we get together and discuss which ones are going well and how our experience is going with our tools,' Boswell said. 'I think over the next several years, we'll probably hone in on some that are the most successful.'
Scoop
30-06-2025
- Climate
- Scoop
Spring Creek Resident Confronts Council Boss In Soggy Showdown
By , Local Democracy Reporter A Spring Creek resident confronted the boss of the Marlborough District Council as he and the mayor visited the flooded township after a "precautionary" 24-hour evacuation order was lifted. The showdown happened at the end of Gouland Street, where residents and contractors were hard at work erecting a sandbag wall to protect houses from surface water coming from a paddock next door. The council had provided the sandbags and an industrial water pump, which was pumping water from the paddock into the adjacent Wairau River. But the angry resident, who would only give his first name, Leo, told council CEO John Boswell they were not doing enough, and were not supplying enough sandbags. Leo claimed the council team was only there because he had called the office asking where they were, as residents returned to their water-logged properties after a night away. Leo told Boswell he was told on the phone the council was "just doing what they can do". "It's not enough... Last year we had the sandbags around that corner, but why this year we don't have any? "I was not happy when they just told me they are just doing what they can do. It's not the attitude. "Why this time, everyone [has] just arrived home and we report to the council, then you guys come. It shouldn't happen like that." Boswell told Leo the council was "prioritising the resources" to the areas that had the "greatest need". But Boswell said he understood Leo's frustration. "I can understand why you're losing your patience. "But please know that we're doing everything we can, as safely as we can, to make sure that we get it back to a state that you can get back into your house and get on with your life as soon as it is safe and appropriate." Sixty homes in Spring Creek, north of Blenheim, were evacuated on Friday morning as heavy rain lashed the top of the South Island. The council was concerned a compromised stopbank could fail and the river could threaten properties. The Wairau River, which ran alongside the township, peaked at just over 4000 cumecs about 5pm on Friday. A "be ready to evacuate" notice was issued to residents of Renwick's Lower Terrace later on Friday after a stopbank there was found to be unstable. The Spring Creek stopbank experienced lateral spread in the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake and was further damaged in the July 2021 Wairau flood. In January 2023, the repair project was reprioritised and funding was secured through the Long-Term Plan process. A $8.7 million construction programme, including $3.6 million from central government, was agreed with the community in May 2024, with groundwork expected to start in November this year before construction was carried out in November 2026. The stop bank was due to be rebuilt by June 2027. Marlborough mayor Nadine Taylor said she felt the council needed another "town hall meeting" with the Spring Creek community following the heavy rain event - maybe in a few weeks' time. The council on Saturday said the stop bank had showed its resilience in the deluge, showing no sign of seepage or slumping. Leo, who had lived on Spring Creek's Hathaway St for two years, told Boswell the council needed to crack on and strengthen the stop bank this year. "I really want to see [someone] working [on it] for the rest of this year," Leo said. "I don't want this one happening again next year. It's so frustrating for everyone here. "I don't mean to be pissed off, but this time it's really annoying. "If we could do something in advance, that would be better. I really care about the people here." A council spokesperson on Saturday stressed the stop bank had performed well and that Spring Creek - like all of Marlborough - was inundated with surface flooding. The council's rivers and drainage engineering manager Andy White said in an earlier press release the Spring Creek stopbank was "extensively monitored" during the rain event. "The good news is there was no observation of any seepage or slumping - the bank performed better than we had hoped," White said. "We have every confidence the community is safe and they were only evacuated as a precaution." Marlborough's 220km network of stopbanks proved resilient during the rain and significant flooding, White said. "Council's ongoing investment including planning for contingencies at Spring Creek and major works at the Taylor Dam have played a significant role in the success of the system during this rain event," he said. The only new issue was at the confluence of the Waihopai and Wairau rivers where a section of the bank suffered damage, which was picked up during routine flood monitoring on Friday and resulted in part of Renwick being evacuated as a precautionary measure. "An immediate temporary fix was made when we saw early signs of failure and it was monitored closely throughout," White said. "There will be a fast-tracked solution to repair the damage."
