MOLINE, ILLINOIS -- WQPT, Quad Cities PBS will hold their annual Champagne on the Rocks Gala on January 29, 2010 at Jumer's Casino and Hotel.  The Presenting Sponsor for Champagne on the Rocks is The Singh Group, Merrill Lynch-Quad Cities, Global Wealth Management.  "The event will acknowledge WQPT's long relationship with Black Hawk College and will kick off the station's new partnership with Western Illinois University by honoring WIU's Dr. Joe Rives, Vice President Quad Cities, Planning, and Technology, for his efforts in making this transition possible," said WQPT General Manager, Rick Best.

Champagne on the Rocks is WQPT's major fundraising event featuring dinner, diamonds, live and silent auction and a musical revue featuring Larry Adams and Jessye Wright. Ms. Wright was recently in the Quad Cities as the alto soloist in The Messiah at Centennial Hall. Mr. Adams will have just completed "The Merry Widow" for the Lyric Opera of Chicago. The two singers will be performing a series of love songs including "Wunderbar" from "Kiss Me Kate" and "All I Ask of You" from "Phantom of the Opera" among others.

Each guest receives a champagne glass with a gem as they enter the gala. Representatives from Expressions Jewelers will be on hand to appraise the gems. Two guests will win a .25-carat internally flawless cut diamond, donated by Expressions Jewelers.  Guests will also bid on 100 items featuring trips to Cancun, Wisconsin Dells and Las Vegas. Golf for four at TPC and tickets to the Quad City Symphony and Circa '21 are also being offered.  "We're very excited by the variety of silent auction items as well as the live auction items that include a John Deere Home Generator and one-of-a-kind vases from artist Steve Sinner," said WQPT Special Projects Coordinator, Bea Brasel.

To view a complete list of auction items log on to www.wqpt.org. For further information or to make a reservation to attend Champagne on the Rocks call 309-796-2424 or log on to wqpt.org.

WQPT is the regional PBS station located in Moline, Illinois on the campus of Black Hawk College.                      

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Guardian Glass will receive Recovery Act tax credit to re-equip manufacturing facility

Washington, DC - Rep Bruce Braley (D-Iowa) announced today Guardian Glass will receive a $900,000 Recovery Act Advanced Energy tax credit to re-equip their manufacturing facility in DeWitt.  The tax credit will expand Iowa's clean energy economy by allowing the DeWitt facility to expand its production of bent solar mirrors.

"As we continue to work our way out of the worst economic climate since the Great Depression, expanding our investments in clean energy manufacturing jobs are the key to real recovery," Braley said. "These are high-quality jobs that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and strengthen Iowa's role in the 21st century economy."

The project at Guardian will modify and enhance the existing mirror line to enable the facility to mirror glass in a single throughput on the production line, while at the same time achieving a multi-layer specialized paint coating to protect and preserve the reflective layers of copper and silver. Preservation of these reflective layers is critical to the achievement of long service lives of highly reflective solar mirrors.

For more information about Recovery Act projects in the First District, click here.

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STATEMENT FROM FORMER GOVERNOR BOB WISE, PRESIDENT OF THE ALLIANCE FOR EXCELLENT EDUCATION, ON THE EIGHTH BIRTHDAY OF NCLB

Alliance President Calls for ESEA Reauthorization in 2010 to Attack Dropout Crisis that Claimed More than 7,800 of Iowa's Students in 2009

Washington, DC - Today marks the eighth birthday of the signing of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), the most recent version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Reauthorization of the law, which was due in 2007, has yet to occur. For every year that Congress fails to address the unique challenges faced by high schools through a reauthorization of ESEA, approximately 1.3 million students across the nation will drop out of school. In Iowa alone, more than 7,800 students left high school in 2009 prior to earning their diploma.

"In many ways, NCLB is a compact disc in an iPod world," said Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education and former governor of West Virginia. "It's still around, but it is in desperate need of an upgrade.

"The best birthday present for Iowa's students is for the Congress and President Obama to enact a new ESEA. It's time to blow out the candles and bake a new cake.

"NCLB rightly deserves credit for requiring schools to report data that focused attention on educational disparities for various groups of students. Unfortunately, due to shortcomings in the law's design and implementation, most improvements in learning outcomes for the nation's elementary school students have not been echoed by their middle and high school counterparts.

"In their brief tenure, President Obama and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan have actively recognized the high school crisis, focused on turning around the lowest-performing schools, and called on the nation to graduate all students ready for college and careers. Over the last several years, congressional leaders have held hearings and developed legislative proposals based on research and best practice that demonstrate ways to improve the law. However, until research, discussions, hearings, and legislative proposals are actually turned into an ESEA reauthorization, none of these positive changes will reach the countless high school students and teachers in thousands of classrooms.

"This eighth birthday should be a commitment that 2010 is the year to harness the progress and increase momentum around high school reform into a reauthorized ESEA that strategically addresses the high school crisis and begins turning the more than one million dropouts a year into high school graduates who are ready for college and careers.

"Today, our message to the Congress and President Obama is, 'Don't delay. Reauthorize ESEA.'"

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