AM-580 News Features

At your home, chances are your TV, computer and other electronic gear were made overseas. That's because it's cheaper to make them there. And it's cheaper to get rid of old electronics overseas. Someday, your old cell phone or CD player might end up right back where it started: in China. University of Illinois journalism student Ted Land visited a Chinese city where electronic waste is shipped by the thousands of tons. Pollution from that waste is threatening the health of people who live there.  He submitted this story for The Environment Report.

(Ted's story will be part of China: Beyond the Great Wall, a documentary produced by UI journalism students, July 28 at 5pm CDT on AM 580)

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Read blog entries as Ted and other UI journalism students explored China

A record label in Champaign is making a name for itself by selling old recordings… really old ones… some of them originally on wax cylinder. Archeophone Records specializes in music made between the late 1800’s and the early 1920’s - music that is virtually ignored by the big labels in this era of the iPod. Archeophone has been praised by scholars, and won a Grammy for its efforts. In a new version of a story first aired on March 5, AM 580's Jeff Bossert reports.

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Archeophone website

Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is the subject of a three-day forum at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. At age 88, the author of “The Gulag Archipelago” rarely leaves his home near Moscow. But his wife and two of his sons are taking part in the forum. AM 580’s Jim Meadows talked with Natalya Solzhenitsyn about her husband’s work since returning to Russia.

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Traveling overseas can give Americans a glimpse of their image among the rest of the world. AM 580’s Tom Rogers just completed his first journey to China, and in his opinion, what he found was both a wakeup call -- and, at times, cause for a good laugh.

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Read blog entries as Tom and UI journalism students explored China

Each day China opens itself to thousands of visitors -- some on business, others on vacation.  Still others come to China because there's no better place to learn their careers.  AM 580's Tom Rogers is in China -- and last week he traveled into the interior to visit an Urbana man who's come to hone his craft.

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World War II was a transforming event in American history.  But the number of people who have direct memories of the war is shrinking by the day.  In September, WILL-TV will air the Ken Burns documentary "The War."  In conjunction with the program, WILL is helping with an effort to record as many oral histories as possible from those who lived through that era, either on the battle lines or on the home front.  AM 580's Tom Rogers introduces us to people who have made it their mission to get memories on tape.

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Read about WILL's efforts to collect World War II stories

China Trade

China is a nation of 1.3 billion people.  In other words, multiply the US population by more than four, and you have China.  That’s a highly attractive business market for people in Illinois who have something to sell.  But the head of the state of Illinois’ trade office in Shanghai says setting up shop in China is NOT a simple proposition.  On the other hand, as AM 580’s Tom Rogers reports from Shanghai, it can be done, and done very well.

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Each year antibiotics save millions of lives.  But many antibiotics are increasingly losing their effectiveness. Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana are now tackling this problem. In their search for new lifesaving antibiotics, the National Institutes of Health have awarded a group of scientists a $7 million grant. Michael Koliska reports.

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Earlier this month, EIU selected William Perry (left) as its tenth president.  Perry comes from Texas A&M University, but received masters and doctoral degrees from the University of Illinois.  Perry says a return to the Midwest from Texas was simply a bonus -- AM 580's Jeff Bossert spoke with Perry about what appealed to him about EIU and the challenges he'll face.

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Takei is best known as Mr. Sulu from the series "Star Trek."  But besides his newly-revived acting career (he has a new generation of fans for his role in the NBC series "Heroes" and appearances on the Howard Stern radio show), Takei has been politically active as a human rights activist.  Takei grew up during the Second World War, and at the age of 5 he and his family were sent to a Japanese-American internment camp.  Takei spoke with AM 580's Michael Koliska during a recent appearance on the UI campus.

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George Takei's personal website

Candidates for the Champaign Unit 4 School Board answered questions about the federal consent decree, No Child Left Behind and the police presence in middle and high schools during a PTA forum before the March 17 election.  But one question that wasn't asked was how the candidates felt about the administration of Superintendent Arthur Culver.  AM 580's Jim Meadows posed that question after the forum was over, and seven candidates gave their answers.

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The recent decision to ban smoking in Champaign bars and restaurants could play the most publicized role in who wins in next week's city council election.  But there are other issues that could influence Tuesday's vote for three at-large council members.  AM 580's Jeff Bossert looks at the issue of growth in southwest Champaign (left: Curtis Road interchange, with Barkstall School in the background) and the approach each candidate wants to take.

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Illinois’ largest teachers’ union has lined up behind Governor Rod Blagojevich’s proposal to launch a new business tax to boost funding for education and health care. But the Illinois Education Association’s president says that does not mean the union is opposed to an alternative plan that the governor opposes – a plan that would raise the state’s income tax while lowering local property taxes. As AM 580’s Tom Rogers reports, all IEA president Ken Swanson (left) wants to see is the end of what he calls chronic state underfunding.

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