Copernicus Channel Guide — September 1999

What gas do air conditioners use to cool your house? Freon. Where is the longest coastline in the U.S.? Juneau, Alaska.#

After the worst recruiting year in Army history since 1979, military officials are thinking about changing their Number 2 ranked jingle, "Be all that you can be," to appeal to the Generation-X crowd.#

You'll need more than muscles to tend to your new pet: a 60-pound Siberian cyber tiger. Start by building a home and choosing food for your feline. Then let him loose to hunt around his new habitat.#

Teachers who want new ideas for their tired lesson plans will find Learning Center a terrific resource for improving curriculum standards and creating exciting classroom projects. Parents and kids should also check out the Voyager Adventure Station, as well as our other links, to keep the summer fun.#

Participate in discussion groups, go to friendly chat areas, or find an electronic pen pal, locally or from across the world.#

How do your school's academic standards measure up and what can you do to foster improvement? Many federal and state agencies publish free information for school communities, and the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education is a great resource. Even if your school isn't part of a localized Copernicus community, School Biz offers valuable information for educators and parents alike.#

Though school's out, continue your child's education "after the bell." Read movie and music reviews, conduct science experiments from home, or even plan your entire family vacation online using our featured family resources.#

Next week, concerned companies will watch the calendar carefully, fearful that the date 9-9-99 may translate into a stop-command for computers and cause dreaded Y2K-like damage.#

Six years after the Branch Davidian fire in Waco, Texas, Attorney General Janet Reno is expected to appoint an outside investigator as early as today who will scrutinize the part the FBI played in the tragedy.#

Early Tuesday, Indonesia imposed martial law in East Timor, where violence erupted Saturday after the East Timorese people voted to split from Indonesia.#

Just weeks after a devastating earthquake hit Turkey, a powerful earthquake rocked nearby Athens, Greece on Tuesday.#

Although to some today -- the ninth day of the ninth month of the 99th year, or 9/9/99 -- is a test case for the feared Y2K bug, most experts believe programmers have already fixed computers so as to avoid the problem.#

Beating the Monday deadline set forth in a new Middle Eastern peace agreement, Israel handed over 7% of the West Bank to Palestinian administrative control on Friday, three days before the transfer was expected.#

The largest celebration for the big names of the small screen, last night's Emmy Awards looked like a TV rerun because many of last year's winners enjoyed repeat performances and took home their second, third, or even fourth awards.#

When it comes to integrating the sexes on submarines the Navy says "no," citing factors such as the lack of privacy and the high cost of building female accommodations on subs as reasons to keep the vessels off-limits to women.#

With no time to lose, the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously on Wednesday to deploy peacekeeping troops to East Timor, where fighting between independent-minded East Timorese and anti-democratic Indonesian militia has destroyed the small province.#

Seven Texas teen-agers died last night when an unidentified gunman entered the church where the young people were attending mass and fired at the crowd before he ended the rampage by shooting himself.#

While residents of the coastal Southeast were trying hard to get out of the path of Hurricane Floyd Thursday, one USA TODAY reporter was trying even harder to get into the path of the monster storm, aboard a special hurricane research plane.#

At the age of 67, Raisa Gorbachev, the outspoken and atypically public wife of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, died today after a battle with leukemia.#

Many of Taiwan's 22 million people were rocked out of their sleep last night when a massive earthquake of 7.6 magnitude (about the same force as last month's quake in Turkey) hit the country, leaving over one thousand people dead and even more injured.#

U.N. peacekeeping forces managed to quell the violence between Indonesian militia men and pro-democracy citizens in East Timor. However, refugees who returned home to Dili Tuesday found little left of the capital city besides wreckage and rubble.#

NASA engineers have lost contact today with the Mars Climate Orbiter, a satellite headed to Mars to search for water. The probe should have re-established radio contact with the U.S. early this morning, but has failed to reconnect.#

Once again Bill Gates is at the top of the Forbes 400 Richest Men list, a directory of America's biggest earners whose combined net worth equals $1 trillion, more than the gross domestic product of China.#

Former Vice President Dan Quayle is expected to drop out of the Republican presidential race today, citing lack of enough funds to make a strong showing in the primaries.#

Chicago's plans to erect a 108-story building could help it reclaim the title of the city with the tallest building in the world, which its Sears Tower lost to Malaysia by 33 feet in 1996.#

America's political pundits are speculating over whether actor Warren Beatty will soon announce his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination, from which he'd promote his "Bulworth" platform of reducing poverty and improving schools.#

As the 1999 National Education Summit begins today, at least ten states are expected to follow Denver's lead and test a plan in which teacher pay is tied to student achievement rather than career longevity.#