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Pandemic Primer January 14, 2021

Innovation in the Age of Coronavirus

Now entering its final stages, the evolving COVID-19 pandemic continues to reshape the world around us, and myriad Long Island forces – large and small, corporate and nonprofit, industrial and academic – have risen to the challenge. Innovate Long Island presents Innovation in the Age of Coronavirus as a running journal of this region’s resourceful response to the greatest global challenge since World War II. Stay healthy, dear readers.     Numbers getting ugly across…

Opinion January 5, 2021

Island innovators mourn loss of LIFT leader Muscarella

By RAY DONNELLY and JULIE ALLEGRETTI // The light switches have been off at the Long Island Forum for Technology for years, but sadly, the brightest light of LIFT is gone out forever as Diane Muscarella passed suddenly on Dec. 27. As a single mother, Diane earned degrees at Nassau Community College and Hofstra University while launching a career in marketing. She was a fixture at LIFT for years, and in her role as director…

Newsletters December 11, 2020

No. 554: Indiana arrives, Concordes soar, Hofstra picks a prez and Adelphi goes to the Grammys

  The end is nigh: And nobody’s complaining, dear reader, as we wrap up this blustery workweek and anticipate a weekend of bustling holiday shopping – or what passes for it in confused, confounded 2020. You WILL enjoy yourselves: It’s Friday, Dec. 11, and to our many readers in the Central Luzon, a joyous Pampanga Day, 500 years in the making and decreed four decades ago by that old Filipino softy Ferdinand Marcos. Here in…

Education December 9, 2020

Data, diversity drive new Hofstra University president

By GREGORY ZELLER // An ambitious and effective academic leader with a major-league résumé and a long history of diversity-centered initiatives will take Hofstra University’s reins this summer. The university’s Board of Trustees announced Wednesday that Susan Poser, currently the University of Illinois at Chicago’s provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, will become Hofstra’s ninth president, succeeding current University President Stuart Rabinowitz. Rabinowitz has served as president for 20 years, capping a half-century run…

Newsletters December 2, 2020

No. 551: Indoctrinating, stimulating and surveillance testing – and bringing the extinct back to life

  Reunited: And it feels so good, dear readers, as we’re back on schedule and back in your inbox, right where we belong. It’s OK to say you missed us. We missed you, too. It’s Wednesday, Dec. 2, and we’re midway through this busy holiday-season workweek – and, blessedly, into the final stretch of problematic, perplexing and (literally) plagued 2020. Let’s finish both in style. Peaceful transition: Speaking of big finishes, less than two weeks…

Economic Development October 8, 2020

Planes, trains, autos: Wheels up on LIMA ‘ground hub’

By GREGORY ZELLER // A key component of the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council’s strategic investment has taken flight – actually, broken ground – at Long Island MacArthur Airport. This week, a gaggle of state and local politicos joined regional rainmakers to mark the beginning of work on a new “intermodal facility” at the Islip aerodrome, designed to increase air traffic by facilitating easier ground transportation. The project will renovate an existing airport building…

Opinion September 15, 2020

The crowd goes quiet: For sports, the psyche of silence

By GREGORY ZELLER // You’ve been there, sports fan: bottom of the ninth, sudden-death overtime, one-point lead, two-minute warning, third and long, the odd-man rush, the alley-oop, the champ goes down, the kick is up… And in every sport, behind every great play, around it and inside it and below and above it – the roar of the crowd. Sports are back. In fact, after months of reruns and silence, fans are enjoying an unprecedented…

Newsletters August 21, 2020

No. 525: On Wilt the Stilt, Lincoln and ‘Looney Tunes’ – and a dose of reality for Walt Whitman

  Good Friday: You’ve done it again, dear readers … another long workweek bested, another summery weekend earned. Well done. Since we can’t do it properly – bellying up in your favorite dive and getting lost in some smokin’ house band – ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Cowboy Junkies! An even 50: Before we jump in, aloha to our many readers in Hawaii, where Statehood Day – marking the 1959 admission of the 50th…

Newsletters August 14, 2020

No. 523: Veteran ‘Ventures,’ pandemic page-turners and throwing shots with the real Doc Holliday

  Engines of innovation: Welcome to Friday, dear readers, as we race to the end of another sticky summer workweek and throttle down for another well-earned weekend. Low key: It’s Aug. 14 out there, and honestly, the pickings are very slim – the best we could do is the Day of Remembrance of the Defenders of the Fatherland in Abkhazia, which is, like, not even a real country. It’s also National Financial Awareness Day, which…

Opinion July 23, 2020

Coghlan: Opportunity abounds, for the flexible

By HARRY COGHLAN // It is disorientating (to say the least) to think back on our original plans and goals for 2020, and realize how so many of them had to be revised or abandoned. But as Robert Burns (sort of) said, best-laid plans often go awry, and when they do, the organizations that prevail are the ones able and willing to adapt, react and produce. In short, flexible organizations stand the best chance. While…

Coronavirus July 6, 2020

Phase Four arrives on LI, with bombs bursting in air

By GREGORY ZELLER // Strap yourselves in, Long Island, but keep strapping on those facemasks. And batten the hatches for some political fallout, too – Phase Four has arrived, with fireworks. Governor Andrew Cuomo, one of President Donald Trump’s more vocal critics, pulled no punches in Monday’s daily briefing, in which the governor announced strong COVID-19 numbers across the state, confirmed that indoor dining in New York City is on hold indefinitely and essentially accused…

Newsletters June 12, 2020

No. 509: On peanut butter cookies, LaGuardia Airport and kelp – plus baseball (remember that?)

  Phase 2 Friday: You’ve done it again, dear readers! Another tough workweek conquered – and, as your reward, Long Island’s first weekend under Phase 2 reopening protocols. Well played! It’s June 12 out there, and while you’re probably itching for your teenager to find a summer job after a half-year of home learning, it is indeed the U.N.’s World Day Against Child Labour, which is a very different matter and no joke. That’s, like,…

Newsletters June 3, 2020

No. 506: On eggs, Olds, strategic tax breaks and Anderson Cooper, plus a rare Adelphi honor 

  Stuck in the middle: Welcome to Wednesday, dear readers, as Long Island languishes in Phase 1 and we innovate our way through another quasi-quarantined workweek. Ready, set, Joe’s: It’s June 3 out there, and before we begin, Innovate LI is thrilled to introduce our newest sponsor – St. Joseph’s College, which operates campuses in Patchogue and Brooklyn (in addition to SJC Online) and this week joins our pantheon of prestigious boosters. More on St….

Startups June 2, 2020

At Hofstra, getting pretty good at this pandemic pivot

By GREGORY ZELLER // Still planning an in-person grand finale for October, one of Hofstra University’s most popular entrepreneurship efforts has transitioned – smoothly, if temporarily – to a virtual format. Hofstra’s Healthcare Entrepreneurship Community Challenge has performed the pandemic pivot, with a full week of online mentorship and study commencing Monday for 31 participating healthcare startups, including four based on Long Island. Engaging them online is an impressive cross-section of health, law and med-tech…

Coronavirus May 28, 2020

A summer sans internships? No way, schools say

By GREGORY ZELLER // With canceled internships and rescinded job offers adding insult to injury for shortchanged U.S. college students, Long Island universities are working hard to keep their flocks working this summer. Longstanding career- and business-development programs at Adelphi University and Hofstra University have refocused their efforts through a pandemic-friendly lens, with a growing number of virtual internships and other remote-working (and remote-learning) opportunities now in play. The need for a Summer 2020 internship…