If everyone can give another round of applause for darlene johnson. Apologize for the technical difficulties and thank you for rolling it with and going ahead and starting. I appreciate it. I just want to make sure that i give her a proper introduction. Darlene currently serves as the associate director in the office of violence against women. In this capacity, she supports the director and managing the Community Engagement division and implementing Grant Programs that respond to violence against women. So thank you. Now were going to hear from elizabeth allen. Dr. Allen is professor of graduate studies and Higher Education at the university of maine and director of stop hazing consulting. Dr. Allen was Principal Investigator for the National Study of student hazing and is currently directing the hazing prevention consortium. So lets give her a round of applause. Thank you. Can everyone hear me okay . Great. Its great to be here. Thanks so much for choosing to come to this session toda
Blowers complaints seriously. Within vha, the problem of intimidation, retaliation may be magnified by what some consider a protective culture of the medical profession. It is often thought to be against the code to point out colleagues mistakes or where a nurse or a tendant is told it is appropriate to question a physician or surgeon. The natural tendency is to close ranks, to not die that problems exist or mirs stestakes were ma. So after we listen to the testimony before us this evening from the whistle blowers, the office of special counsel and the va will anything change after we hear what the whistle blowers have to say and how do we fix this culture and encourage all va employees to step forward to identify problems and work to address the problems. Changing a culture is not easy. It cannot be done legislatively or 33inthrowing additional resos at it. Talk is cheap. Real solutions are hard to find. It is clear to me that the va as it is structured today is fundamentally incapabl
Acting secretary gibson recently stated that he was deeply disappointed not only in the substantiation of allegations raised by the whistle blowers but also in the failures within the department to take whistle blowers complaints seriously. Within vha, the problem of intimidation, retaliation may be magnified by what some consider a protective culture of the medical profession. It is often thought to be against the code to point out colleagues mistakes or where a nurse or a tendant is told it is appropriate to question a physician or surgeon. The natural tendency is to close ranks, to not die that problems exist or mirs stestakes were ma. So after we listen to the testimony before us this evening from the whistle blowers, the office of special counsel and the va will anything change after we hear what the whistle blowers have to say and how do we fix this culture and encourage all va employees to step forward to identify problems and work to address the problems. Changing a culture is
Yes, thank you. [ inaudible question ] about the needs around the clubs that kids go through hazing to get into because i think when theyre interpreting the event as a problem, a lot of kids going into a club think of it as an art. Its kind of a brainwashing. And theyre going to the hazing but they feel its an honor that theyve been asked to do it. And so the Marketing Needs to be up front about the clubs and the aura so that the kids are alerted way before they even are in the situation where theyre intervening. Absolutely. I wholeheartedly agree with you. Were moving in that direction. Yeah. Unfortunately, were out of time. I do want to encourage everyone here to please read through the biographies. They have a lot of information about the work that theyre doing. What their offices are doing. Theyve provided you with some great resources today. And some great jumping off points. So thank you both sincerely for coming. Cspans 2015 student cam competition is under way. This nationwide
Backgrounds where we do not want to leave anybody behind. We want everybody to enjoy the riches of technology. We want them to enjoy the economy in San Francisco. That is why were working so hard to make sure our central marketplace is welcoming of all these Technology Companies, making sure that we can work with other cities. I am very lucky to be part of the u. S. Conference of mayors, and they allow me to represent San Francisco as the Innovative Center for all the rest of the cities across the country. So we get to compare information and there. What these days i will get to talk to you while i am in washington, d. C. , and you can hear what i am saying across there, so we can enjoy it wherever i go, you know i will be working and not fooling around. Finally, we also are using technology to join our private companies in hiring san franciscans. Hopefully some of your kids, some of your grandkids as well, are going to enjoy some of these great jobs in San Francisco, because the compa