Workplace revelations
Acton author Richard Trombetta has a new book out called ``Mustard Doesn't Grow on Corn! How Respect, Openness, and a Simple Process for Innovation Can Lead to Great Ideas ," which calls on companies to encourage ``an idea explosion " among their employees. A 15-year veteran of corporate work, Trombetta has spent time as a sports producer for an ABC-TV affiliate in Providence . He now runs his own company in Acton called The Innovation Company and consults with
EARNING GOLD: Greater Lawrence Technical School students Kirssi Gonzalez, Misael Abreu, and Suhaiti Villa came home last month with the gold medal from SkillsUSA Championships in Kansas City, Mo. The team won for its ``Spring into Spring " community service work with Lazarus House in Lawrence. The three students from Lawrence -- along with others in the school -- repaired, sanded, and painted two porches, helped clean and landscape, made picnic tables and planters, ran a canned food drive, served meals, and ran an Easter celebration in the preschool center, as well as helped with flood cleanup there. The school's community service team also took a gold medal last year. This year, it beat 52 other state champion teams.
MISSION IN WASHINGTON: Billerica High student Christopher Cancelliere will get an insider's view of how leaders in Washington are planning defense and homeland security policies. Invited to attend the Presidential Classroom in Alexandria, Va., from July 15 to 22, Cancelliere and other high school juniors and seniors from across the country will meet with members of Congress, presidential staffers, military officials, and journalists as part of the National Security in a Democracy program. They will have private tours of the Pentagon, Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency, and Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.
MARLEY LEGACY CONTINUES: Arlington's Matthew Jenson, who teaches ``The Music and Life of Bob Marley" at the Berklee College of Music, worked with the college and the Rita Marley Foundation to bring two students from Ghana to a five-week Summer Performance Program for free. The program begins Saturday, and students take classes in jazz, rock, pop, fusion, and rhythm and blues , along with music theory, private lessons, instrumental labs , and ensemble playing. Jenson auditioned 18 musicians last spring while he was in Ghana speaking at the Africa Unite 2006 Symposium in Ghana, produced by the Rita Marley Foundation. He selected trumpeter Joanna Denaka, 21, and jazz pianist Victor Korsi Dey Jr., 26, to come this summer. Ayiku Reginald Senam and Josephine Peamka will attend next summer.
NEW MAN ON CAMPUS: Merrimack College in North Andover has a new police chief, Ronald J. Guilmette, who comes with 35 years of law enforcement expertise. From 1968 to 1999, he was in the Massachusetts State Police, serving as a lieutenant colonel and as an assistant superintendent in the State Police academy. In 1998, he was Lawrence's interim police chief for one year. At one point in his state police service, he commanded the Massachusetts Port Authority and provided security for Logan Airport. Guilmette is now an adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and a project director of the Massachusetts Police Leadership Institute.
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