Well-seasoned: Welcome to Wednesday, dear readers, and the midpoint of a suddenly-very-autumnal mid-November workweek.
Before we dive in, a quick scheduling/cooking note: Innovate Long Island will be brining, baking and basting next week, so please do your best to enjoy the holiday without us – watch for this Friday’s regularly scheduled newsletter, then back at you with fresh content (and maybe a few tasty Thanksgiving leftovers) on Monday, Nov. 28.
Let’s give them a big hand: There’s room for all on the International Day for Tolerance.
Live and let flame broil: Before all that broasting and toasting, we’ve got work to do – and we hurdle this week’s hump on the U.N.’s International Day for Tolerance, an annual Nov. 16 celebration of cultural diversity.
We also get to train for next week’s heavy lifting with National Fast Food Day, an all-American salute to all-beef patties and such.
Fifth and long: Speaking of heavy lifting, construction crews would push north for 40 years before reaching the Harlem River, but the first stretch of Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue – now a global symbol of commerce and wealth – opened to the public on this date in 1824.
Floating a new idea: Other New York City innovations associated with this date include the cork life preserver, patented on Nov. 16, 1841, by NYC inventor Napoleon Guerin.
Smart gun: The NRA once stood proud.
Best shot: Some sources say Nov. 17, some say Nov. 19, but most settle on Nov. 16, 1871, as the date the National Rifle Association – on a higher and more patriotic mission than its current, self-destructive Second Amendment crusade – received its New York State charter.
Green grow the lilacs: Not everything happens in New York, you know – for instance, happy anniversary, Oklahoma! You became the 46th U.S. state 115 years ago today.
Sky, fall: And it was this date in 1973 when the third and final crew to serve aboard NASA’s Skylab blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center.
The three-member team would spend 84 days in space, the longest stay of any Skylab crew; unmanned Skylab would finally crash into Australia and the Indian Ocean in 1979.
Encyclopedic knowledge: French mathematician Jean le Rond D’Alembert (1717-1783) – a philosopher and writer best remembered as a co-editor of Encyclopédie, a science, arts and crafts dictionary highlighting the best of Enlightenment-era scientific thought – would be 305 years old today.
From K to Z: Still brings a tear.
Also born on this date were American musician William Christopher “W.C.” Handy (1873-1958), considered the “Father of the Blues” (at least by himself); American chemist Joel Hildebrand (1881-1983), a pioneering educator who helped define physical chemistry; American actor Burgess Meredith (1907-1997), a popular performer who toured the “Twilight Zone” many times; Japanese videogame designer and producer Shigeru Miyamoto (born 1952), the Nintendo legend who created Mario, Zelda and other digitized icons; and American novelist and short-story writer Andrea Barrett (born 1954), who counts a U.S. National Book Award for Fiction among her many prestigious honors.
Dr. K forever: And take a bow, Dwight Eugene Gooden! The one-time Mets ace (briefly a Yankees folk hero) – blessed with ungodly talent, cursed by relentless demons – turns 58 today.
Wish Doc well at editor@innovateli.com, where your news tips always pop the mitt and your calendar events are like a 90 mph slider on the black (that’s a good thing).
About our sponsor: Whether it’s helping in site selection, cutting through red tape or finding innovative ways to meet specific needs, businesses that settle in the Town of Islip soon learn we take a proactive approach to seeing them succeed. If your business wants to locate to or expand in a stable community with great quality of life, then it’s time you took a closer look at Islip.
BUT FIRST, THIS
Something Latinx-tra: Both Long Island community colleges are well-represented in the 2023 class of the State University of New York’s Hispanic Leadership Institute.
The institute – a program of SUNY’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion – has named Nassau Community College history instructor Leonardo Falcón and Suffolk County Community College Associate Dean for Student Affairs Edward Martinez among its annual fellows. The LI duo join seven other professors and administrators from across the State University system for the annual training program, described by SUNY as “a rigorous six-month experience for [university] leaders of Hispanic descent” packed with in-person continuing-education classes, personal-assessment tools and webinars with state and national Hispanic leaders.
Fifty-three State University staffers have completed the HLI program since it launched in 2018, making it “one of SUNY’s most meaningful executive training programs,” according to Interim Chancellor Deborah Stanley. “HLI is an important piece of SUNY’s strategy to expand and strengthen diversity, equity and inclusion at every level of our system,” Stanley added. “My gratitude to Gov. (Kathy) Hochul and state lawmakers for their investment in HLI every year.”
Dream on: President Timothy Sams is proud of SUNY Old Westbury’s legacy of educating immigrant students.
Living The Dream: A national college-access program for immigrant students has welcomed SUNY Old Westbury to its growing list of partner institutions.
TheDream.US announced Nov. 10 it would add the Old Westbury institution to its roster of 80-plus partner colleges in 21 states and the District of Columbia. Through the national program, academic awards up to $33,000 are now available to foreign-born students hoping to pursue bachelor’s degrees at SUNY Old Westbury during the 2023-24 academic year.
Those immigrants can be documented or undocumented – no Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or Temporary Protected Status is necessary for immigrants who came to the United States before the age of 16 and before Nov. 1, 2017. “We are proud of our record of serving Dreamers, who we know work so hard to better their own lives and the lives of those in the [community],” noted SUNY Old Westbury President Timothy Sams. “We thank TheDream.US for partnering with our campus to grow the opportunities for Dreamers to pursue their education as part of what is their uniquely American experience.”
POP PEOPLE
Episode 10: Matt Cohen, LIA leader.
Before you fill your Thanksgiving table (and your belly), fill your mind with Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast, a true smorgasbord of innovation delights featuring a rare selection of well-done conversations – more than 30 superstars of the Long Island innovation economy dishing out huge portions of front-line knowledge and unique perspective. Grab a plate.
TOP OF THE SITE
Talking to the wind: A critical public-comment period will help decide the fate of an ambitious wind-farm plan off southern Long Island.
Pandemic booster: Stony Brook Medicine’s Laboratory for Comparative Medicine gets a running start on the next health crisis, with a boost from Dr. Fauci.
Empathy play: You know that sad little twinge you felt back there, when we said there won’t be any Innovate Long Island newsletters next week? That’s how the unsubscribed feel all the time. Help them.
VOICES
Facing a conservative SCOTUS with no qualms about overturning history, Affirmative Action confronts its greatest legal challenge in 50 years, according to Sahn Ward Braff Koblenz Managing Member and Voices legal anchor Michael Sahn, who foresees huge repercussions on Long Island and beyond.
STUFF WE’RE READING
Upper chamber: From judges to energy to the environment, the Democratic-majority U.S. Senate is about to get busy. Politico predicts the path.
Get it together: How to organize your digital life – and why you’d better do it fast. Vox cleans up nice.
Thin blue line: The U.S. Postal Service is warning holiday senders away from blue mailboxes. LifeHacker stamps its approval.
RECENT FUNDINGS
+ Hemanext, a Massachusetts-based biotech focused on blood processing, storage and transfusion, raised $18 million in Series B equity funding led by Sonenshine Fulford Group.
+ Boardable, an Indiana-based virtual board-management and meetings platform, raised $2.6 million in Series A-1 financing led by Base10 Partners, VisionTech, Collina Ventures and IU Ventures.
+ Sequencing.com, a California-based direct-to-consumer DNA interpretation company, raised $5 million in funding led by Lerer Hippeau, Red Sea Ventures, Global Founders Capital, XRC Labs, Correlation Ventures, Red Antler, Mucker Capital and Gaingels.
+ Rewst, a Florida-based robotic-process automation platform for managed-service providers, raised $21.5 million in Series A funding led by OpenView.
+ Nabsys, a Rhode Island-based biotech focused on electronic whole-genome mapping, raised $13 million in funding led by Hitachi High-Tech.
+ Contraline, a Virginia-based biotech focused on male contraception, raised $7.2 million in funding led by GV, Rhia Ventures, ShangBay Capital, Amboy Street Ventures, MBX Capital, Graphene Ventures and Metaplanet Holdings.
Like this newsletter? Innovate Long Island newsletter, website and podcast sponsorships are a prime opportunity to reach the inventors, investors, entrepreneurs and executives you need to know (just ask the Town of Islip). Marlene McDonnell can tell you more.
BELOW THE FOLD (Change Is Gonna Come Edition)
Bright side: Thank you, climate change.
That happened fast: Climate change is warming the Pacific Ocean – and triggering more extreme weather events – decades earlier than expected.
Half empty: Will average temperatures rise enough by 2031 to trigger a global catastrophe? Science says it’s 50-50.
Red-yellow-blue-silver lining: On the upside, global warming is creating more rainbows.
Change up: Please continue supporting the amazing organizations that support Innovate Long Island, including the Town of Islip Office of Economic Development, always ready to help businesses of all sizes change their fortunes for the better. Check them out.
