Transcripts For WHYY PBS NewsHour 20141224

Ifill plus, can replacing classrooms and lectures with video chat seminars create a more engaged learning environment . How one San Francisco startup is breaking down the walls of higher education. Those are some of the stories were covering on tonights pbs newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by moving our economy for 160 years. Bnsf, the engine that connects us. Lincoln financial committed to helping you take charge of your life and become youre own chief life officer. Supported by the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation. Committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. More information at macfound. Org and with the ongoing support of these institutions and. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Ifill from holy places to battlefields, christians and others made ready today for the coming of christmas. In bethlehem, thousands of the faithful, along with tourists, crowded manger square, traditional birthplace of jesus, in advance of Midnight Mass. At the vatican, pope francis led Midnight Services before throngs of worshippers in st. Peters basilica. And in afghanistan, american troops marked the day with hymns and prayers. There is sadness, i miss them but they also know that we serve wonderful mission with the afghanistan people. We want to serve them and support them and they know i am here doing a good thing and so its worth it. Ifill here at home, weather made for some Holiday Travel headaches. Heavy rain and high winds in the northeast, plus a wintry mix in chicago, canceled about 500 flights nationwide. Meanwhile, Power Companies restored electricity to thousands in mississippi. Deadly storms, believed to be tornadoes, ripped through the state late yesterday, killing four people. Two major shippers have moved to make sure theres no mass delay of christmas deliveries. The wall street journal and others reported today that u. P. S. And Federal Express have capped air express shipments from big retailers. Last year, an 11thhour surge of online orders overwhelmed the system, and two million packages failed to make it in time. Authorities in berkeley, missouri, near ferguson, called for calm today, after a white policeman killed a black teenager last night. Police say 18yearold Antonio Martin pulled a gun as he was being questioned about a theft when he pulled a gun, and the officer shot him three times. New protests quickly started, followed by clashes with police. Crowds continued to gather, but the local mayor warned against jumping to conclusions. What i saw in this incident is not what people portray, this is not a policeman in the city of berkeley halfcocked, going out. You couldnt even compare this with ferguson or the garner case in new york. Ifill the police said the officer was not wearing his body camera, and his cars dashboard camera did not activate because its emergency lights were off. Security camera video did not clearly show the object in martins hand. In iraq, a suicide bomber attacked a sunni Group Fighting Islamic State forces today, killing at least 24 people and wounding 55. It happened at a military base in a town just south of baghdad. Most of the dead were sunni militiamen, the rest were iraqi soldiers. Ebola deaths in three west african nations are nearing 7,600. The World Health Organization announced today there have been 7,573 confirmed deaths in guinea, liberia and sierra leone. Thats out of more than 19,000 confirmed cases across the three nations. Officials have said the actual numbers may be far higher. Former president george h. W. Bush spent the day at a houston hospital. The 41st president was admitted tuesday as a precaution after he had trouble breathing. Mr. Bush is 90 and suffers from a form of parkinsons disease. Two years ago, he was hospitalized nearly two months with bronchitis. Sony pictures expanded its release of the interview to a National Audience today. The film comedy, about a plot to kill north koreas leader, may now be rented or purchased on line. It was already being released in independent theaters. Major theater chains dropped plans to screen the film after threats from a hackers group. Wall street had Holiday Hours today. The Dow Jones Industrial average gained six points to close at 18,030. It finished above 18,000 yesterday, for the first time. The nasdaq rose eight points today to close at 4,773. And the s p 500 slipped a fraction, to finish below 2,082. Still to come on the newshour a rare glimpse inside the Islamic State, from a western writer given special access behind the terrorist front lines. The mounting pressure over recalls of airbags in millions of cars on the streets. A new, virtual kind of college that throws out the need for lectures, tenure and even campuses. Maintaining the holiday spirit during family gatherings even when there is political discord. Capturing teenagers interest in science with little more than a spark. Ten years after indonesias devastating tsunami, one villages fight to rebuild. Ifill the american Led Coalition fighting the Islamic State group suffered a blow earlier today. U. S. Central command issued a statement saying that a jordanian f16 war plane crashed in northern syria. The jets pilot was apprehended by Islamic State fighters. Its the first time a coalition servicemember has fallen into the jihadist groups hands. Apart from its high profile slayings of american journalists and foreign aid workers, brutality, and rapid land grabs in iraq and syria, very little is known about the Organization Also known as isis or isil. Tonight, we hear from one westerner who just spent 10 days inside Islamic State territory and lived to tell about it. German author, activist, and former politician juergen todenhofer did the seemingly impossible. After months of negotiating over skype, he won a written security guarantee from Islamic State forces, granting safe passage through their territory, so he could research an upcoming book. The Islamic States seat of power, and then, to the iraqi city of mosul. They were tightly supervised, but allowed to shoot interviews with Islamic State fighters and even prisoners. What did they tell you . What will happen to you . Will you be free one day . translated they said, they said, your government, and you are prisoners of the Islamic State and thats what they said. They didnt say we will kill you or slaughter you. Ifill the writer also reported seeing lowflying u. S. Aircraft. He left Islamic State territory a few days ago and is now back in germany. I spoke to juergen todenhofer earlier today. Mr. Todden hover, thank you for joining us. I want to start by asking you why you decided to go behind the lines with Islamic State forces . Because i started to write a book about isis at the beginning of the year. And after some months i realized that there was no real authentic information. And usually when i write a book about afghanistan i go to karzai, the president karzai and i went to the taliban, the leaders of the taliban. And i went to iraq. I met the government and i met the iraqi resistance. I spent seven days with them. So its my normal strategy when i write something, that i speak to both sides. Ifill you didnt go by yourself, you went with your son. And what im youruous curious about is how you got in, who do you call to get behind the lines with isis forces . I called, i wrote to ira iran about which were on facebook. I got about 15 answers and with these 15 people, i started skooib conversations seven months ago. And at the end, two were interesting. And with these two people i skyped maybe 20 hours all together. And we had long discussions about their religion and also long discussions about a guarantee. Because i said i would only come to the country if i would get a clear guarantee. And i got a guarantee from the office of the but the problem was it was not sure whether the guarantee was given by the office of the califa. I couldnt prove it so the discussions continued, and at the end i had the impression that the guarantee was correct and i started. Ifill so you kind of took a risk that this was again bin. Did you genuine, did you have to make any pledges of allegiance to the clal i fate to gain access . Caliphate to gain access. No, not one word, one positive word. They knew that i had written several times very hard and critical articles against is. They knew that i had met several times president assad. They knew all that and i told them. You know, you have read what i have said but. They said we dont care about your personal opinion. So what were your impressions about how strong isis is, there is some debate here and around the world about the scope of the Islamic State forces, whether it functions as a government, whether it has a Justice System and what its ultimate goal is. What impressions did you take away . I got the impression that i asked is is much stronger than our western politicians think. I have met the taliban several times, their leaders. I was in the algerian war. I met the foreign leader nationale liberation. That knocked down the french. I have seen very, very strong guerrilla troops. But i think is is the strongest i met because they have a which is incredible, and they think, they believe that they have a historical mission. And this mission is to destroy all the religions besides the three religeo, besides the jew, the christians and the muslims. The muss ims in is style which means to destroy all the muslims which are not who are not democratic. A muslim who is democratic has, as they told me, to be killed because he puts laws made by man above laws made by god. And if they make these beheadings, they dont have the feeling that they do something bad. They think yes, we do it. It is necessary. Ifill there is much conversation as well about the influx of foreign fighters from the United States and other places. Did you see evidence of that . I think the foreign fighters play, especially in syria, a very Important Role in syria, 70 of the fighters are foreigners. And in iraq 40 are foreign fighters. And these foreign fighters are enthusiastic too. I spent two last days of my stay in a kind of recruitment house. Its the first house where the people from europe or from the United States arrive and i met french people. I met u. K. People. But i met also americans. I met americans from new jersey. I met people from the caribbeans who had just passed their law exam and who prefer to fight in the Islamic State instead of being a successful lawyer. And every day more than 50 people arrived, only in this recruitment center. And they have several. So they can lose a hundred men in one day, it doesnt matter. Ifill you spent time in iraq and syria, rak a m osul. Was there a difference in what you saw in those two places . Yeah, i only can give an impression. I had the impression that in mosul their support is stronger because in mosul now you have only sunnis because the shias, the yazids and christians have been killed or forced to flee. And that in raka, Bashar Alassad is still at least as strong as is. What is told me. And assad is working also with a trick. He is still playing paying salaries to his people in raka and it seems to work. So the situation in raka is not very clear. Ifill how does is compare in your impression to al qaeda. Al qaeda is a non an empty shell beside is. Is is much stronger. There is no comparison. Al qaeda has never been as strong, even in the times of osama bin laden, has never been as strong as al baghdadi. And even if this al baghdadi, this so call caliph will die, the next one will come. Because they think they have this historical mission. And they see that the west doesnt have a successful strategy. There is no strategy. You cannot bomb you cannot knock down these 5,000 fighters is fighters in mosul in a city of 3 million inhabitants, residents. Because they dont live in one apartment or in one house or in two houses or five houses. They live in different apartments. And every apartment, one or two. They dont stick together. So you cannot bombard the whole city of mosul just to fight down 5,000 fighters. And if you send your troops, even your best troops, i think they would have very little chances to fight in the guerrilla war in a big city. Because an american soldier, even your best soldier, the marines or special forces, they want to come home. They want to survive. But these people want to die. They want to win and they are ready to die. Ifill Many Americans their only exposure to isis is what they do to western hostages. How did you get out . How were you not taken hostage and killed . I had this guarantee. And the guarantee of the caliph is the most important document that you can have in this country. I had to fear, i think, much more the bombardment by the syrians and also by americans. Some americans airplanes sometimes have been very, very low. And when our driver who was a secret service guy was driving between rak a m osul he was always watching through the window to see if American Drones were following us. So i think my risk to be beheaded was not too high. Otherwise i wouldnt have done. Ifill juergened toen hover, thank you so much for joining us and telling us your story. Thank you very much. Ifill its been a record year for auto recalls, with disturbing stories about deaths, injuries and warning signs that were either missed or ignored by manufacturers and the government. One of the biggest recalls of the year involved airbags in more than 24 million vehicles, from a dozen manufacturers. But the manufacturer of the airbags, takata corporation, has resisted calls to do more. And today, its president stepped down. Hari sreenivasan picks up the story from there. Sreenivasan todays change is the biggest move inside takata since the troubles became well known. Stefan stocker, the companys first nonjapanese president , will be replaced by the companys chairman and c. E. O. , shighesa takada. Hes the grandson of the companys founder. But does the move help takata deal with muich bigger concerns over safety . And get out from the cloud that has hung over the business since the reports began . David shepardson of the detroit news has been covering this story. And joins me from grand rapids, michigan. So why did they finally make this move . Well, i think this is clearly another indication of mr. Takada and the family exerting more control over the companys operations. As you said, mr. Stocker was the first nonjapanese president of the company and over the first ten months the company has seen tens of millions of vehicles recalled around the globe, its raised the stakes for the company to try to show both the public and automakers that these vehicles are safe and more importantly, that the company has an effective solution to fixing the issues and finding the root cause. Srennivasan and speaking of that root cause, when millions of Vehicle Owners take their cars back into the shop to get this fixed, do we know that the new air bags wont have these problems . Well, thats the real question. And the other issue is how long will it take to actually get those Replacement Parts. At congressional hearings this month, members of Congress Asked that very question. The problems with these air bags are twofold. One are production issues as well as problems with the propellant at two factories in north america. And many of the issues have shown up four, five, six years after these vehicles were exposed to high humidity. We dont know if four or five years from now these same problems will surface in these replacement air bags. Meanwhile, if will it will take at least six months to a year or more to get these millions of vehicles air bags replaced because there are so many vehicles ahead of them. Now takata says in january theyre going to up the production rate from about 300,000 replacement inflators to 450,000. But in its wake of that Companies Like honda have taken a step of hiring an outside, another company to also build Replacement Parts am but they wont be ready for another six months. Srennivasan and the company, takata, had been resistant to this wider recall for quite some time, right . Right. Back in midnovember the national Highway Traffic Safety Administration demanded that five companies and takata declare the driver side air bags defective across the country. Before that these vecks were recalled in high humidity areas like florida, hawaii, parts of the gulf coast. But they would not expand that nationally. Then then the government learned of an incident in august in North Carolina, a ford mustang in which shrapnel exploded from a air bag causing leg injuries. That was enough for the government to decide that this air bag recall should be expanded nationally. And then on monday bmw became the last of the five companies demanded to expand their recall. Takata has not taken that step. And the real question is will they do it eventually or is this about cost. Srennivasan speaking of cost, is this the new normal . I mean all of these recalls do add some cost to the Overall Vehicle and the manufacturer. Are manufacturers more likely to pass those costs on to consumers . You know, theyre going to have to at some point because these costs are running into the billions of dollars for these recalls. I mean at the end of this year, the u. S. There have about at least 61 million vehicles recalled. Thats more than twice the alltime record set in 2004. On monday of this week a new national highway traffic administrator Mark Rosekind was sworn in. Hes now taking a fresh look. And he comes from the National Transportation safety board where he was a very strong safety advocate. And hes been charged with really shaking up the agency, making sure theyre doing a good job of holding auto companys feet to the fire. So its hard to see nitsa returning to an era when they were not as aggressive. If anything, they are likely to be more aggressive going forward. Srennivasan and what are auto manufacturers bracing for when they know there is going to be a new sheriff in town and he has a more aggressive stance . Well, i think you are already seeing in the flood of recalls this year, that Auto Companies are being much more careful to follow the rules. And the rules are within five days of determining of a defect, you have to recall those vehicles and notify the government. Already this year weve seen record fines to companies for not notifying the government in a timely fashion. Not recalling enough vehicles and not recalling similar vehicles with problems. And the government has taken a very tough line with companies that drag their feet. So companies are trying to move faster. Theyre taking a look at all of their recall operations and theyre basically bracing for hundreds of millions or billions of dollars in future costs. Srennivasan all right, David Shepardson of the detroit news, thank you so much for joining us tonight. Thanks, hari. Happy christmas to you. Srennivasan you too. Ifill with the cost of a College Education in the neighborhood of a quarter of a Million Dollars at some schools these days, there are growing numbers of students, educators and some Silicon Valley executives who are starting to rethink the value, and the business model, of a higher education. As science correspondent miles obrien reports, a small group of pioneers believes there may be another way. How are you feeling. Its a freshman dorm in a college with some fresh ideas about higher education. So much fun. Ian van buzz does kirk is one of 28 founding students at San Franciscos minerva school. Everyone is very driven, very humble, very motivated toward not only their own goals but also the goal of creating an institution, a Lasting Impact on higher education. Reporter like everyone else here, he is a gifted student. He was accepted at Duke University but ened up coming to a college that feels like a Silicon Valley startup. Because it is. Sultano is also in the founding minerva class. I think people have been thumping around the world guinea pig. But i would not call us guinea pigs at all. Because guinea pigs cant necessarily say what they are feeling or how they are thinking. Minerva is a highly competitive liberal arts College Without a single classroom, much less aniffy trimmed campus. The dormitory is on one floor of this old apartment building. Students will spend the first year here, and then the subsequent six semesters living and studying in six different cities around the world. Next year they head to buenos aires. And berlin. And but the professors dont go with them. In fact, they can be anywhere including home. Because they see their students exclusively online via proprietary Software Platform called the ago of learning forum. It fosters a facepaced engaging seminar style class. No lectures allowed. Studies show students only retain about 10 of what they learn this way two years later. So what are we seeing here, is this the progression of the idea. Ben nelson is the founder and c. E. O. Of minerva. Imagine you were to go to a store to buy anything. And they would say oh, yes, this product is a great product. You know, 90 of them failed within two years. Who would buy that product . Well, hello and welcome, everybody. Instead of tenure, professors here get stock options. And tuition . 10,000 a year. Although the founding class gets a free ride. No federal grants or loans are accepted. Before he began designing a college from scratch with postit notes, nelson was the president of the online photo Printing Company snapfish. Our goal is to create a movement where you actually have substantially better quality education, in a more effective way, in a lower cost way. And have that be a model for other institutions to emulate. He has used his startup acumen to raise 90,000 in venture capital. Minerva is a forprofit corporation, accredited through a partnership with californias tech graduate institute. The founding dean is former harvard professor stephen koslin. He designed the curriculum based on years of reserve on visual perception, mental imagery and memory. If you get engaged with something, are you very likely to remember it, whether you want to or not. Just the act of thinking it through is going to make it stick. Kosslyns former colleague harvard professor eric mazure pioneered the idea of act of learning 24 years ago when he realized his students were not retaining much of his lectures on physics. I discovered that my students werent even learning the most basic things. They were learning they were mem orizing and applying things by rout. So that made me realize that my quote, unquote, excellent teaching wasnt that excellent at all. And made me think about what i was doing. So he flipped his classroom around. Students started gathering information on their own. Class time spent applying the knowledge to solve problems. In may in minervas Nonprofit Academy named him the first winner of the minerva prize for advancements in higher education. He says he is thrilled to see his philosophy embraced in this manner but my main worry is the fact that their entire or a huge part of their experience is in a dorm room. People are sitting in rooms to participate with a wall between them. And not actually physically bringing them together. We could have done that. We could have just said hey, lets do everything that we are doing now, except do it in a room. It turns out the education is worse. What they get is not what you might expect when you think of online learning. Minerva bears little resemblance to Massive Open Online Courses or mooks which bring the lecture haul hall to cyberspace. Good afternoon everyone. We watched as a professor taught this 70 minute class in formal analyses. I love to treat my studentses appears so we can solve problems together. The observed difference is equal to 0. 078. The subject on this day was statistics. It begins with a quiz. So you can explain why you think two is not correct . Yeah. So it is a smaller value for alpha, i think why two is wrong. Yes. No way to quietly zone out on facebook in this class. Students get called on frequently reasons rajon, you are here, tell me what is the it really is taking the seminar that you would get in real life, distilling it down to what it should be, what it should communicate, and then applying that to an online setting. They can raise their hands electronically and ask questions via text. He writes on the virtual blackboard, a shared document seen by all. He divides the class into breakout groups with a problem to solve on their own and takes a poll. Of those who chose slightly increased, i would be very curious to hear what your reasoning is here. Everyone is watched and recorded by an unblinking eyewitnesses thank you for your attention and thank you for your enthusiasm. And i will see you on thursday. He then replays the class and grades students on their performance. They get instant and constant feedback on how they are doing. Its really useful to be able to have the professor right there, who later goes back and is able to give you feedback on what you said and help you out with certain concepts you might be struggling with. We are taking this principals learning and were creating a completely new way of teaching that is based on the principles of learning. And what is interesting to me is that actually no university has done that. Its crazy. Courses here are tightly linked to each other them atically. All aimed at teaching 129 socalled habits of mind. It is liberal arts with a lot of structure. The problem with the Traditional University is that there is no glue. Whatever happens in the course is whatever the professor wants. And whatever the professor wants has no idea what other professors have done with those students. Do you think the universities are really paying attention to what are you doing. Yes. Really, how do you know . The glare is palpable. We feel them staring. Educators are, indeed, watching this experiment closely. But since it is so new, the jury is still out. Minerva is clearly not for every student or for every curriculum. But it may take a brash startup that is aiming high to fix whats wrong with higher education. Miles obrien, pbs newshour, san frank. San francisco. Ment ifill it is, of course, the holiday season. A time of joy and love, and of course, the occasional family dispute. One moment on cspan recently caught our attention. Brothers brad and Dallas Woodhouse were speaking about their own sharp political divide when they took a surprise call. Lets go to joy in raleigh, North Carolina. Hey, somebodys from down south. Are you right im from down south. Oh gosh, mom. And im your mother. And i disagree that all families are like ours. I dont know many families that are fighting at thanksgiving. Is this really your mother. This is my mom. I was very glad that this thanksgiving was a year that you two were supposed to go to your inlaws an i was and im hoping will you have some of this out of your system when you come here for christmas. Ifill is it so unusual to have a family that fights over politics during the holidays . We decided to ask a few people in a heavily political area, just outside of washington. Im one of those people. We just dont discuss it. Im on one end and my brother is on the other end and we just do not discuss it, period. It is the holidays, no matter if it is christmas, hanukkah, kwanza, its time for family and everybody put thing as side and worry about what, who we are. Family. Just remember they are your family, you dont have to agree with them. I think we cant get away from it. I think it is inevitable. So we are all just kind of enjoy ourselves, hopefully safe and ifill Hari Sreenivasan has more on the science of relationships and how to avoid problems at your family table. Sreenivasan joining me now from raleigh, North Carolina is the civility columnist for the washington post, steven petrow. Thanks for being with us. So a lot of us are heading to dinners or time with family that inevitably has some stress built in because of the opinions that they might hold, whether its about politics, whether its about other issues that are facing america right now. How do you deal with those family members who you just really disagree with strongly . Well, first of all, great to be with you, happy christmas eve. You know, i put a little post up on my facebook wall earlier this afternoon and quickly got some snark back on this question. Eat by yourself or bring lots of duct tape. So im going to move away from the snark here. Let me just say, this is not really easy. Everyone thinks civility is something that just rolls off your tongue. We have just been through a bruising political season, left and right, democrat and republican. So many folks are habit yated on social media where snark and sass and everything is the language du jour. And all of a sudden bam, its christmas day. And family is in one room around one table looking at each other. And hoping to get out of there alive. So i have three pointers i want to make suggestions about. First is, make some prerules. That means you need to do that tonight. What do i mean by that . If you know the triggers in your family, the hot topics, lets say its Marriage Equality or ferguson or abortion, agree beforehand you are not going to have them on the table tomorrow. Just put them aside. You can come back. Number two, dont personalize it. If you are going to talk about issues, dont dare say uncle john, you are, you know, barack obama incar national or Mitch Mcconnell incarnate, whatever it is. So keep it general. And i think the last point is really important. We have lost the art of conversation and listening. I think a lot of that comes from social media, hari. We are so used to blocking and blaming and defending that we dont know how to listen. We dont know how to engage people. I really want to encourage everyone to do a little bit more of that and see where these conversations can go. Because its really great to have friends and family that you dont always agree with. You actually learn from them. Ive seen some stats that say a quarter of us have defriended people based on some of the things that they have shared on social media sites like facebook or twitter. Policy disagreements, really, that we dont necessarily think about. But we say, you know, somehow it does affect the core of us and who we are. Yeah. I was very surprised that pew study statistic, 26 have defriended or blocked for political matter it is not even something personal. It is politics. And weve really gotten habit ated to not wanting to see those who disagree with us. You know, and not wanting to talk with them. And thats reflective of the larger culture. And i think when many of us say what can we do about this world that we live in, one thing we can do is start at home at the holiday table tomorrow. You know, one strategy that people sometimes take is 9 silent treatment. Lets just avoid this all together. Lets just deal with this once a year. I can be in the same room with this person but i dont have to talk about it. Lets just not talk with them all together. Does that work . Im afraid not. But its a very prevalent tactic or strategy. And theres a study that came out from texas christian not long ago, 14,000 people. And it looked defects of the Cold Shoulder effect or silent treatment. And basically the result was it is man i latif and not productive. So folks, again, its about talking. It doesnt mean that were going to agree. It means that were going to find our way through this. And i think at every table tomorrow there will be conflicts. That is really a given. Its how we manage them that is important. How we talk our way through. So no silent treatment, sorry. Srennivasan and if its not intense political disagreement or about the state of race in america or inequality, what if it is just the person that you are going to have dinner with that is annoying. And you know its annoying and other people know its annoying but you have to sit with it and bear it. What is your best tip. Hari, do you have one of those in your family too. Im take the fifth. Im take the fifth too because i have two families probably watching. You know, theres actually a beauty about having one person in the family who irritates everybody. It bonds and bands everyone else together. That used to happen in my family with my late uncle ray, i can name names now. You know, take it with a grain of salt. The evening is only going to be a couple of hours long. And then it will be next year. And family lasts forever. Family lasts forever, exactly. Thats what this holiday is about. Its about family. Lets not forget that. Steven petrow, you can also find other tips online. Steven petrow, thanks some of for joining us. Thanks, hari. Happy christmas to you. Ifill every year, Fire Departments in the United States respond to more than 200 Christmas Tree fires, which are often more deadly than other house fires. Tonight we take a look at a program at the university of maryland that uses Christmas Tree burns to Teach High School students, not only about fire safety but about the relevance of science and math. The newshours april brown has this report, part of our american graduate series, a public Media Initiative funded by the corporation for public broadcasting. Reporter this time of year most people would buy a Christmas Tree to make the holidays more festive. But scientist Isaac Leventon has a completely different plan for this one, which hasnt had any water for a week. Its all in the name of science. Whats really making us safe is that there is nothing near that tree for 1015 feet that can catch on fire. Reporter leventon is a graduate student at the university of marylands department of Fire Protection engineering. His largescale, controlled burn of this tree and two others is the finale for a fire science class he created for High School Students. I think everyone at some point likes playing with fire and that kind of keeps you here. Reporter the 10th and 11th graders will gather data from each burn and eventually compare the heat release rates to determine which fire is more powerful. The class is free for the dozen students who live near the College Park Campus who apply and are accepted into the eight week program. Leventon started it two years ago with the goal of using fire to spark and grow interest in science, technology, engineering and math, collectively known as the stem fields, which experts say are critical to americas future economic competitiveness. But some educators have struggled to make these subjects engaging and relevant. In this class, setting fires does both. For a number of them you know you have to study calculus or chemistry and physics, and in the one semester we have i cant teach them all of these things but i can show them here is how we can use basic chemistry to predict the temperature of any flame of our material and then you can say ok maybe chemistry has an application. Reporter students like erin stewartson and pablo ruiz do not receive high school or College Credit for taking the class, which makes it all the more impressive they show up every other week for several hours after school. My school doesnt have an Engineering Program and to do this for free, even if you dont get credit its still very good knowledge you can use. Im really looking at engineering for college its right around the corner and this class is supposed to give you a look at what engineering is supposed to be like. Reporter the lessons range from the basic, like how a candle stays lit. You have your ignition and that kind of melts the wax and then the wick absorbs the wax and that melted wax it evaporates and thats whats burning that evaporated wick, its called fuel vapor and that constantly burns until you put it out. Reporter to the more complex including fire tornadoes. Erin stewartson wanted to learn more about them, so she and leventon created one in the lab. So a fire tornado is basically a normal fire plume. Basically just something lit on fire and then when an enclosure goes over it a rectangular enclosure, it creates an angular momentum which makes the fire spin into a tornado or a whirl. And they do exactly what tornadoes do, they pick trees up and take trees out of places, theyve taken firemen out of places which is pretty crazy. Just seeing how it forms and watching it happen in the lab that was pretty amazing. Reporter the class is structured just like a University Level science course, with similar expectations and coursework like labs and tests. Here, though, the final project is presented to classmates and parents. So its not just study something, measure something and present it but really learn about whats happening in the field and what are people doing and why does that matter. Reporter the introduction to what College Classes will be like, and discussion of potential careers are two reasons pablos mother, norma ruiz, is glad her son signed up. I think there should be more of these opportunities for High School Students especially the ones interested in engineering and the sciences so they can have a better idea of what they want before they get to college. Theres Nothing Better than getting to college knowing what you want. Reporter back in the lab, students continue to gather data. This time from a tree thats been soaking in water for two weeks. It takes nearly five minutes for it to catch fire, compared to the drier tree which was almost fully consumed in less than a minute. Its valuable to see how the fire is going to behave and know what thats going to feel like so we get that out of our tests. I wrote a number for what size fire it is and knowing ok an 800 kilowatt fire that means tree is burning 14 feet up into the ceiling and i can feel it from 30 feet away thats just invaluable experience. Reporter and even though leventon is expected to get his ph. D. Very soon, the Department Hopes to find someone who can continue the class. A grant to fund it next year has already been approved by the society of Fire Protection engineers. Im april brown in college park, maryland for the pbs newshour. Ifill ten years ago this week, a devastating tsunami slammed southeast asia, killing nearly a quarter Million People in 14 countries. Tonight, in an encore presentation, we take a look at the remarkable recovery of one community in indonesia that was nearly wiped out by the natural disaster. Newshour special correspondent kira kay has that story. Reporter on a sunday morning, the villagers of lampuuk gather for a feast, celebrating the start of the harvest season. But lampuuk is also celebrating the life that has returned to it, a decade after a wall of water swept the village away. Misran yusuf is the villages imam. He recalls a scene eerily like this one on dec 26, 2004. translated there was a wedding that day. We were preparing food and all of a sudden an earthquake hit. It was so strong people fell. We had no idea that the sea water would rise, we had never heard of a tsunami. Reporter the quake that hit offshore was a 9. 1 on the magnitude scale. Within 20 minutes, waves 60 feet high hit the region at hundreds of miles per hour. translated it sounded like thunder. I held my breath and the water came over the rooftops. When i surfaced i saw people clinging to a tree trunk. They pulled me on board and we floated until we reached the next village. Reporter 130,000 people died and whole communities vanished. Lampuuks lone standing mosque became an iconic image of the disaster. Ten years later it is hard to picture that destruction on the streets of the capital city, banda aceh. The once shattered downtown is now firmly back in business. The riverside, choked with debris, is a thriving waterfront again. People overall seem happy. The tsunami had carved a new shoreline, disappearing whole blocks of the community of ulee lee. But now it is a favorite beach destination for families, only small hints remain of what happened here. Mayor Illiza Saaduddin says the region has built back better. translated the economy has improved, our Poverty Level has decreased to a rate that is below the national average. Our infrastructure is better than even before the tsunami, roads are now reaching remote villages. There are a lot of lessons that aceh can share about how we got back on our feet and how we were able to cooperate with many institutions. Reporter the International Disaster response was a massive 7 billion in aid and reconstruction. While not entirely corruption free, the process was overall transparent and responsive to actual need. The biggest challenge was to provide housing for half a million newly homeless. But ten years on, nearly everyone who needed a permanent home has gotten one. translated the tsunami feels like it was only a month ago. But thank goodness, we have rebuilt our lives. Reporter murni and sakinah both lived in ulee lheue and managed to outrun the waves. After living in a displacement camp, they were given houses in a sprawling community overlooking banda aceh, known as jackie chan hill the action star helped fund the construction. translated wed prefer to stay here, rather than in ulee lheue where its so close to the sea. I get frightened even wheres wind like this, let alone an earthquake. Reporter in laampuuk, 800 of the 1,000 residents died, but survivors chose to return to their ancestral land. And they now have an action plan. translated if a quake is strong, we rush to the nearby hill. We also have people on lookout by the sea, if the level changes they will rush here and alert us. Im so grateful for the help from other countries. A lot of countries came, even george bush and bill clinton came to my village reporter acehs gratitude to the world is clear. Banda acehs central park has been turned into a monument of thanks, each donor country acknoweldged individually. A World Class Museum to the tsunami is a huge weekend draw, most of the visitors are acehnese, many too young to remember what happened here. The walls describe in detail the global response, and there are displays teaching the science at the root of the disaster. And nearby, a startling site, a massive electricity barge that was carried three miles inland by a wave and dropped in the middle of a neighborhood. Authorities decided to leave it in place. Lina herlena is a certified tourguide. It shows our strength. It shows our strength that after the tsunami our lives have not stopped. Our lives have not ended. It also teaches our generation lessons from what happened in the tsunami. Reporter these lessons extend to new Emergency Response procedures, implemented by the citys tsunami center. Dr. Ella meilianda manages the program. The road is wider now. And the coastal road has been designed in a way that it is quite far away from the coastline. And then they have clear marks of evacuation routes. Reporter tsunami sirens dot the skyline, they warn citizens when an earthquake of seven or higher is detected out at sea. When they sound, residents should make their way to a vertical evacuation site water resistant high rises with a helipad pad on top. We have 17 junior high schools under our program. And for these schools, they know what to do. They have built their own evacuation route, where the Meeting Point for all these children, and how the parents should pick them up. Reporter but the first activation of the system didnt go very well. In 2012, an 8. 6 earthquake hit the area and people panicked, not following evacuation procedure and jamming the streets with vehicles. Meilianda agrees that more public training is still needed, but says the psychological legacy of 2004 is also to blame. Suddenly it happened again and they got really traumatized and did not know what to do, its just like a blank. What we have learned also throughout almost ten years now, is that the recovery is more toward the physical recovery, reconstruction, but not really on the trauma healing itself. It still needs to be done in a more sustainable way. Reporter tour guide lina is also a survivor. She finds a form of therapy through her work. At the beginning of working here i felt like it was very hard to talk to other people, to answer the same questions about what happened to me at the time. I feel like i experienced flashbacks. But as time goes on, it really helps me to recover from the trauma. Reporter perhaps most startling in acehs story of recovery is the perspective acehnese share that the tsunami, for all its destruction, also had a silver lining. It ended 30 years of civil war that had already torn apart society, leaving thousands dead and many people tortured by the occupying indonesian military. It was kind of like almost endless. I mean, we never thought that it would end at some point. But because of the tsunami, then everybody stopped to think, ok, we have to stop this conflict. so this is really like a blessing in disguise for the acehnese community. Reporter within months of the tsunami, the indonesian government and separatist rebels signed a peace deal. The presence of aid organizations at the time kept aceh open to the world and ensured the peace would hold. On a beach that ten years ago was littered with the debris of peoples lives, the palm trees sheared off at the stump, acehnese families today are enjoying a feeling of normality for the first time in decades. Free from war, more prepared for disaster if it comes again, and grateful for the time they have now. Ifill that piece was produced in partnership with the bureau for international reporting. Online, at pbs. Org newshour, we have a look at how tsunami Warning Systems have advanced since the 2004 indian ocean disaster. Ifill again, the major developments of the day. A jordanian warplane went down in syria, and Islamic State militants captured the pilot. Hes the first member of the u. S. Led coalition to fall into their hands. And christmas began arriving around the world, with Midnight Mass services in bethlehem and at the vatican. On the newshour online right now, Downton Abbey takes itself a little less seriously. The cast offers up a christmas spoof of the british melodrama for charity. Watch to see who makes Lady Grantham faint. All that and more is on our web site, pbs. Org newshour. And thats the newshour for tonight on this christmas eve. On christmas day, tomorrow, if prison is a time to pay a debt to society, when does that payment end . We will look at a movement that is trying to help felons get on with their lives, and their careers. Im gwen ifill, well see you online, and again here tomorrow evening. For all of us here at the pbs newshour, thank you, and have a very merry christmas. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by lincoln financial committed to helping you take charge of your life and become youre own chief life officer. And by the alfred p. Sloan foundation. Supporting science, technology, and improved Economic Performance and Financial Literacy in the 21st century. And with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Captioning sponsored by Macneil Lehrer productions captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org this is nightly Business Report with tyler mathison. Brought to you in part by the street. Com and actions alerts plus where jim cramer and fellow Portfolio Manager stephanie link share their investment strategies, stock picks and market insights. You can learn more at the street. Com nbr. Still running the dow ends higher again. This time, the index having its strongest sixday streak in more than four years. Different views, stocks are sitting at or near record levels. The economy seems to be gaining strength, as well. But do wall street and main street see things the same way . And crowd funding a cure. How hope and generosity are working to ending a deadly disease. We have all