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A stranger watching children file out of San Francisco’s Rooftop School when the bell peals each afternoon might look around for a time machine. Down the left side of the driveway walks a group of children slated for “parent pickup” while down the right a teacher leads a line of almost exclusively African American and Latino kids toward buses. It would all have a Little Rock Nine sort of feel, but for the absence of national guardsmen and the laughing salutations exchanged across the space. That this is San Francisco Unified School District’s transportation success story helps explain why some are calling for change.

More than 25 million children, over 55% of U.S. public K-12 students, climb aboard school buses each day, according to “Beyond the Yellow Bus,” a 2014 report from the Center for Cities and Schools at the University of California, Berkeley. But in many places, “a lot of transportation … has been cut over the last ten years,” says San Francisco Board of Education Member Matt Haney. In his city, fewer than 10% of public elementary students now ride school buses, with ridership among non-special education students decreasing from 3300 to 1700 between 2011 and 2017, and schools served for these kids falling from 58 to 33. As a result, even though San Francisco offers citywide school choice—allowing all students to apply to any of its 100-plus public elementary programs—many schools are in reality accessible only to those who live within walking distance or whose parents have the time and money to drive.

The link between limited school transportation and decreased school choice is neither conjecture nor specific to San Francisco. A 2009 report out of the University of Washington demonstrated with a survey of parents in Denver and Washington, D.C. that “transportation is indeed a barrier to choice.” Lots of parents told researchers they would have chosen a different school if better transportation options had been available, but the following groups were particularly likely to say so: “lower-income parents, minority parents, single parents, parents with less education and parents in Spanish-speaking households.” It’s not just because these caregivers often have less access to reliable cars, but also that schools considered “good” tend to be located in higher-income areas. In other words, low-income students generally have farther to go and less capacity to get there. Some refer to this phenomenon as the “geographic opportunity gap.”

When lack of transportation means less dispersion, it is a source of both economic and racial isolation, leaving diverse cities with segregated schools. In San Francisco that looks like Cesar Chavez Elementary with a student body that’s 88% Latino and John Yehall Chin Elementary at 90% Asian. Since diversity benefits all kids, the situation doesn’t just hurt students and teachers at schools such as Dr. Charles R. Drew College Preparatory Academy where 85% qualify as socioeconomically disadvantaged, but also at places like Grattan Elementary School where wealthier, whiter students cluster.

One obvious solution is using public transit, but that can be difficult, in part because of the way buses are controlled. Some school buses are owned and operated by school districts, but a large chunk of yellow bus service (72% in Pennsylvania as of 2012) is contracted out, much of it to national and international companies. The lobbying power of these for-profit enterprises is significant, and the Federal Transit Administration enforces a “tripper rule” prohibiting transit agencies that receive federal funding (which is almost all of them) from operating public bus service “in competition with private school bus operators.” Most localities work around the rule by having public bus routes happen to run past schools and sending extra buses around start and release times, but doing so requires inter-agency cooperation and sometimes controversy.

What’s more, many families can’t afford two tickets a day, and even when cities waive those charges through programs like YouthPass in Portland, Oregon, “the other big thing,” says Todd Ely, director of the Center for Local Government Research and Training at the University of Colorado, Denver, “is just age. So for high schoolers it totally makes sense … but elementary-aged kids [aren’t] going to ride a city bus by themselves.”

More fundamentally, both traditional school busing and public transit are what’s known as “fixed-route transportation” and therefore require making several stops along an indirect path (or a hub-and-spoke arrangement where kids ride to a central point and then out in a different direction). This design translates to long swaths of time spent sitting, something a country grappling with an obesity epidemic can ill afford. The time isn’t just sedentary but also often wasted, managed in triage fashion with drivers struggling to prevent bullying and antics like slithering out the windows. (A pamphlet from the American Federation of Teachers on managing bus time features tips like “never put a student off your bus” and “never use profanity.”)

It’s not uncommon for rural and urban children to spend more than two hours a day on the bus while their counterparts who can walk or be chauffeured to school attend dance class or SAT prep. This “hidden curriculum” has been associated with the achievement gap between low-income students and their peers, and it also includes clubs, internships and relationship-building with teachers and administrators. Members of San Francisco’s African American Parent Advisory Council told school board members in March of 2017 that being “shipped across town” to a better school also means higher truancy rates (because running a few minutes late translates to a missed day) and having to wake up earlier than other kids.

Des Moines, IA is preparing to host a major Minor League Baseball event, as it will welcome the 2018 Promotional Seminar in September. Des Moines is home to the Iowa Cubs (Class AAA; Pacific Coast League) and their home ballpark, Principal Park. The Promo Seminar will run from September 24-27.

With the business of baseball being the focal point of the seminar, it only seems fitting that the event be held in Des Moines. After all, the most brilliant promotional idea in baseball history, playing games at night, started in Des Moines on May 2, 1930, when Lee Keyser forever changed baseball at all levels by installing permanent lights at Western League Park.

While Keyser’s idea 88 years ago in Des Moines may have saved Minor League Baseball following the Great Depression, the game has since flourished, in large part because of the unique, fun and exciting promotions, many of which were generated at the annual Promotional Seminar.

“The Promotional Seminar has truly become the ‘must attend’ event of the year for Minor League Baseball team executives because of the innovative ideas they can take back to their teams and implement for next season,” said Minor League Baseball chief operating officer Brian Earle. “We believe the teams will benefit from additional specialized sessions and the extra day we added this year.”

Some of the new features of the Promotional Seminar include summits dedicated to community relations, video production and club operations.

“Minor League Baseball teams have remarkable creativity and success, not only in promotions, but throughout their ballparks and communities,” said Stefanie Loncarich, Minor League Baseball’s director of special events. “These best practices and wealth of ideas can now be shared more in depth at the unique forum of the summits at the expanded Promotional Seminar.”

In recent years, Des Moines has received high praise from various outlets, making it a “must visit” city. In 2017, Sports Business Journal/Daily ranked it the “Number One Minor League Sports City” in America, while Forbes ranked Des Moines as the “Best Place For Business” in 2010 and 2013. In 2014, NBC ranked Des Moines as the “Wealthiest City in America” based on their formula. The city of Des Moines is recognized as the third-largest “insurance capital” of the world and is headquarters to the Principal Financial Group, Meredith Corporation, Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield and EMC Insurance, among many others.

“We’ve known what a special place Des Moines is for a long time, but the secret is out that this is a thriving city and a great place to live and work,” said Iowa Cubs president and general manager Sam Bernabe. “We’re pretty sure the Promotional Seminar attendees will enjoy their visit to our great city.”

In the summertime, the city is a baseball hotbed, and despite being based in one of the smallest Triple-A markets, the Iowa Cubs have long been one of the top draws at the Triple-A level. Since cracking the half-million-fans mark for the first time in 2002, the club has now accomplished the feat 12 times in the last 16 years and finishes in the top half of Pacific Coast League attendance on a regular basis.

The franchise has claimed Minor League Baseball’s John H. Johnson President’s Award twice (1978 and 2002) and the Larry MacPhail Promotional Award in 1986. In 2014, Baseball America selected Bernabe as the Minor League Baseball Executive of the Year.

“We’ve been blessed with great local ownership that believes in the fan experience being the most important thing,” said Bernabe. “When you combine that with a tremendous staff and a very passionate fan base, not to mention a beautiful downtown ballpark in a thriving city, it’s a great recipe for sustained success.”

After a season-long celebration of 50 years of Triple-A baseball in Des Moines in 2018, Minor League Baseball and the I-Cubs look forward to hosting the Promotional Seminar at the brand-new Hilton Des Moines Downtown and partnering with Meals from the Heartland for the annual MiLB Charities Community Service Project. Meals from the Heartland packages meals for the starving around the world and has produced millions of meals since the organization began in 2008.

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WEBVTT ♪ REPORTER THESE GIRLS ARE ROCKING OUT ON STAGE. COMING OUT OF YOUR SHELL AND BEING PART OF MUSIC. REPORTER: SHE IS A PART OF GIRLS ROCK SACRAMENTO AND JOINED THE CAMP A FEW YEARS AGO AND GOT HOOKED. YOU DO NOT KNOW — HAVE TO KNOW HOW TO PLAY AN INSTRUMENT TO JOIN THE FUN. THE PROGRAM WAS CREATED TO HELP GIRLS FIND THEIR VOICE. >> CAN PICK UP INSTRUMENTS AND TRY. YOU CAN WRITE A SONG WITH PEOPLE YOU HAVE NEVER MET BEFORE. REPORTER: GIRLS LIKE RUN A CAR GETTING OVER THEIR STAGE FRIGHT. >> I WAS SHY COMING INTO THIS. SEEING ALL THE KIND PEOPLE AND MEETING EVERYONE, WE HAVE THIS COMMON GROUND WHERE WE LIKE MUSIC AND THAT IS WHERE WE STAND. REPORTER DISCOVERING SOMETHING THAT GOES WAY BEYOND THE MUSIC. >> THEY REALIZE THAT ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE, THAT THEY CAN DO ANYTHING THAT THEY SET THEIR MIND TO. REPORTER: IT HAS HELPED HER EMBRACE NOT LOOKING LIKE YOUR STEREOTYPICAL GIRL. >> BEING HERE, I WAS TAUGHT THAT IT DOES NOT MATTER WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE. REPORTER: THE TEENAGERS ARE HELPING TO INSPIRE YOUNGER GIRLS. ♪ REPORTER: SOPHIA WILL BE JOINING THE GIRLS ROCK CAMP THIS SUMMER. >> I HOPE THEY CAN HELP ME BE NOT SO SHY. REPORTER THEY ARE HOPING THAT EXTRA FUNDS WILL HELP THEM START A NEW AFTERSCHOOL PROGRAM.

In the second half of 2018, chip giant Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) is expected to launch a new family of processors called Cascade Lake-X targeted at the niche but profitable high-end desktop computer market.  

Cascade Lake-X is believed to be similar in design to the current generation Skylake-X processors, which launched in the summer of 2017. Yet because it’ll have some design improvements as well as be manufactured in the company’s new third-generation 14nm technology (Skylake-X is manufactured using the company’s second-generation 14nm technology), the chips are expected to deliver a solid boost in performance compared to their predecessors.

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Historically, when Intel releases a new high-end desktop platform, it has kept that platform around for two generations. This is because in the past, Intel’s high-end desktop platforms have been consumer-oriented derivatives of its data center platforms. Typically, Intel will only update its data center platforms once every two generations, while its consumer-focused parts (e.g. notebooks and mainstream desktops) get annual updates. 

Beginning with the launch of the company’s X299 high-end desktop platform alongside the Skylake-X processors last year, though, Intel no longer used repurposed data center platforms for its high-end desktop offerings. Instead, it took the same basic technology from its standard consumer platforms and adapted it to the high-end desktop market.  

Per a new leak that comes directly from Intel itself (via Tom’s Hardware), Intel intends to release a new platform alongside the new Cascade Lake-X chips, known as X399. It would seem that Intel now intends to update its high-end desktop platforms annually, in line with its other consumer-oriented platforms. 

Let’s go over what this means for Intel’s high-end desktop platform business. 

Better chance of success

Typically when Intel releases new platforms, those platforms tend to be better than their predecessors. In the case of X399, we should expect that it’ll be more efficient (since the X399 chip will be manufactured using Intel’s 14nm technology — a big upgrade from the 22nm technology used to build X299) and should have significantly more features such as integrated Wi-Fi, more advanced USB connectivity, and so on.

Those additional features should allow motherboard makers to cut down the number of third-party chips that they need for their designs, enabling both a cost structure reduction for the motherboard makers as well as increased dollar content share for Intel (since Intel is providing more functionality, it can get paid for the value it delivers).  

On top of the inherent platform-level features, new platforms give motherboard makers excuses to release new motherboard designs. These designs, thanks in part to the enhanced Intel platform and in part to the ingenuity from the motherboard makers, can prove to be compelling reasons for computer builders to upgrade to the new chips. 

Although it’s good that Intel is apparently releasing an X399 platform alongside Cascade Lake-X, a new platform by itself isn’t going to make or break sales of the processors and related platforms — it’ll only add to the value proposition of the processors themselves. 

What Intel needs to deliver with the Cascade Lake-X processors

For the Cascade Lake-X processors and the accompanying X399 platform to succeed in the marketplace, Intel is going to need to not only boost the performance of the chips year over year (something that’s practically a given), but it’ll likely need to price the new Cascade Lake-X chips lower than it did the Skylake-X parts last year in response to the significant competitive pressure that the company faces in this market. 

Better performance, a new platform, and more attractive pricing across the board could help Intel grow its high-end desktop processor business in the coming year or so.

(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.)

Jennifer Roberts, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

(THE CONVERSATION) The gambling world is waiting with bated breath for the United States Supreme Court decision that could result in an expansion of sports betting. The decision could be announced anytime between today and the end of June.

Since I teach sports betting regulation and gambling law, I’ve been closely watching the developments as well. Although Nevada has had a robust sports betting industry for decades, New Jersey has been at the forefront of the push to legalize sports betting.

In recent years, many other states have prepared for a ruling from the Supreme Court that would overturn the prohibition of sports betting. Even professional sports leagues – which have emerged as the leading opponents of efforts to legalize and regulate sports betting – are looking to cash in.

According to the 10th Amendment of the United States Constitution, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

For this reason, states have traditionally overseen and regulated casino gambling. The Nevada Supreme Court specifically recognized, in a case involving the infamous Frank Rosenthal (portrayed as Ace Rothstein by Robert De Niro in the movie “Casino”), that gaming is “a matter reserved to the states within the meaning of the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution.”

However, in 1992, responding to concerns about the spread of state-sponsored sports wagering, Congress enacted the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, also known as the Bradley Act, named after its lead sponsor, then-U.S. Senator Bill Bradley.

The Bradley Act made it unlawful for any governmental entity, such as states, municipalities or Indian tribes, to “sponsor, operate, advertise, promote, license, or authorize by law or compact” any sports betting. In addition, the act prohibited any individual from operating any sort of sports betting enterprise.

However, the Bradley Act exempted four states from the prohibition: Nevada, Oregon, Delaware and Montana. Of these four states, Nevada was – and remains – the only one with full-scale sports wagering. New Jersey was given a one-year window to legalize sports wagering, but the state legislature failed to take action within the allotted time.

Fast forward to 2011. That year, New Jersey government officials decided they wanted to have regulated sports wagering, so the state introduced a referendum on a statewide ballot that would amend the state Constitution to permit wagering on college, amateur, and professional sports at Atlantic City casinos and racetracks across the state.

New Jersey voters supported the ballot referendum, and in 2012 the New Jersey legislature passed a law to legalize sports wagering.

However, the major professional and college sports leagues – NCAA, NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL – opposed the legislation and filed a lawsuit to stop New Jersey from regulating sports wagering.

In response, New Jersey claimed that the Bradley Act was unconstitutional because it violated the state’s 10th Amendment rights to regulate gambling in the form of sports wagering. In 2013, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the leagues, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to consider the case. The Bradley Act remained intact.

New Jersey pressed on. Having lost on the argument that legalizing sports wagering is equivalent to “authorizing” it under the existing Bradley Act, New Jersey got creative and decided to simply repeal the state’s criminal laws and regulations that prohibited sports book operations in casinos and racetracks.

Once again, the sports leagues sued to stop New Jersey. In response, New Jersey argued that it would be a violation of the 10th Amendment if the state were prevented from repealing an existing law. Again, the lower courts and Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the leagues – but for the first time, the U.S. Supreme Court decided it would weigh in.

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Now we await the decision.

It’s important to note that this case is about more than sports betting, which is simply the subject matter before the Supreme Court. It has more to do with states’ rights, and the decision has the potential to affect other areas of dispute, from marijuana legalization to the ability of cities to protect undocumented immigrants to gun control.

There are several possible outcomes. The U.S. Supreme Court could decide in favor of the leagues, which would mean New Jersey – and any other nonexempted state – would remain prohibited from allowing any sports wagering.

At the other end of the spectrum, the court could declare the Bradley Act unconstitutional, and states and Indian tribes would no longer be blocked from authorizing and regulating full-scale sports wagering.

Another possibility is that the court sides with New Jersey and allows the state to decriminalize sports wagering – on an either limited basis (in casinos and racetracks) or entirely – but not regulate it.

Finally, the Supreme Court could strike the prohibition that prevents states and tribes from permitting sports wagering, but keep the restriction so that individuals cannot conduct legal sports wagering. If this were to happen, sports betting could be permitted by states, but individuals would be prevented from operating their own sports betting business.

About 20 states are already preparing for the event that the Bradley Act gets overturned and are gearing up to pass laws (or have already done so) that will give them the ability to offer regulated sports wagering.

However, there are many unknowns and issues that will need to be addressed: Will state-sponsored sports wagering be run by state lotteries or private enterprise such as casinos or racetracks? Will amendments be needed to permit Indian tribes to offer sports wagering? And will information on sporting events for wagering purposes – such as scores, outcomes or game statistics – be restricted to data generated from the leagues?

There are already disagreements over something called an “integrity fee.” In states where sports betting will likely become legal, leagues have been pressing to receive 1 percent of all amounts wagered on a sporting event.

In Nevada – where legal, regulated sports wagering has taken place since 1949 – such a fee has never been in place. Instead, casinos simply pay the state up to 6.75 percent in a tax on revenues (which is the same tax paid by casinos on other forms of gambling), in addition to a federal tax of 0.25 percent on amounts wagered. States looking to legalize sports betting are proposing varied rates of taxation.

So how might an integrity fee affect sports books?

If we look at the most recent Super Bowl, over US$158 million was wagered in Nevada on the game. If there was a mandated integrity fee, this means that the NFL would have received $1.58 million from Nevada sports books.

But in the case of the Super Bowl, Nevada sports books only made $1.17 million, or 0.7 percent of the total amount wagered. So that means that if Nevada sports books had to pay an integrity fee on the Super Bowl, it would have lost money even before having to pay state and federal taxes, rent, employee salaries and the other costs of operating a sports book. From the industry’s perspective, sports wagering isn’t always as lucrative as it’s often portrayed to be.

For this reason, states must be educated and informed when considering whether to legalize sports betting. If they think they’ll get a tax windfall for schools and roads, they could be sorely mistaken – especially if the leagues end up getting a cut.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article here: http://theconversation.com/with-the-supreme-courts-pending-sports-gambling-decision-states-are-already-prepping-for-legalization-95360.

Copyright © 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.

(Copyright ©2018 KTRK-TV. All Rights Reserved.)

To prepare for finals season, the Tutoring and College Success program hosted a workshop to help students come up with individualized plans to study.

“Preparing for a test is really about planning,” said Marquise Evans, leader of the workshop.

Breaking study guides into blocks which are then studied a week before the test is an effective way to manage time and ensure all the material gets covered, Evans said.

Students should also remember, even though they reviewed a concept the day before, they should still go back and review everything the next day before starting the planned material, Evans said.

“Maybe do one hour and 30 minutes on Saturday, but go back on Sunday and review the stuff you learned on Saturday,” Evans said.

Evans said students could ask others who did well on previous tests to help study or to talk to the professor to review their old tests.Planning when and what to study is the most important thing students could do, Evans said.

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When studying for math classes Evans said to rework all the problems, because math is all about practice.

Students can also prioritize finals preparations for each class based on how they feel about their performance and put more time into studying for the harder classes, Evans said.

“This is it, put everything into getting the grade you want. This ain’t the first or second test where you can save your grade,” Evans said.

Kali Nelson can be reached at arg-new@uidaho.edu or on Twitter @kalinelson6

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A major union preparing to strike against AT&T has compiled a detailed report of U.S. layoffs and call center closures that it says shows the telecom giant has violated its own post-tax reform promises.

The Communications Workers of America, which is in ongoing contract talks with AT&T on behalf of 14,000 workers in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, as well as its nationwide Legacy T contract, says the company has been cutting call center workers in favor of outsourcing, despite its promises to invest in its workers after President Trump’s sweeping tax cuts.

In December, AT&T issued $1,000 bonuses to more than 200,000 employees after the tax reform bill’s passage. The company also promised to increase investment in the U.S. and, the union charges, implied hiring increases.

More: Unions to companies: Show me the money from the tax cut

However, the union says over the past seven years, AT&T has laid off 16,000 call center workers nationwide, while closing 44 call centers, according to a CWA report out today — an early copy of which was obtained by USA TODAY. Many of those jobs have been outsourced to call centers in countries including Canada, Colombia and El Salvador, the union says, and it continued that trend in December.

AT&T counters that the CWA “consistently fails to point out” that the company has hired more than 87,000 in the U.S. in the last three years (17,000 in 2017) and is currently looking to hire thousands more in 2018, said AT&T spokesman Marty Richter. Most union workers are offered another job with the company if their job is eliminated, he said.

But the union charges that the jobs cuts that are occurring unfairly hurt longtime employees, in favor of outsourced and contracted labor. “The outsourcing has created a sense of insecurity for folks,” said Linda Hinton, CWA’s  AT&T Midwest vice president.

“(AT&T CEO) Randall Stephenson has said on several occasions he was committed to raising wages and creating good-paying jobs,” she said. “We are trying to hold his feet to the fire on this. This is what you said, and this is what we expect.”

The report is the latest salvo in the battle between unions and major corporations over who gets to reap rewards from the tax reform measures passed in 2017. AT&T was an early and vocal supporter of the tax cuts. The CWA and other unions have pressured companies to reveal the size of their tax windfall and what they plan to do with it — and what portion would be used to raise wages, bring back jobs from overseas and make capital investments.

In November 2017, Stephenson announced his support for the tax-reform measure and, in December after its passage, said, “This tax reform will drive economic growth and create good-paying jobs. In fact, we will increase our U.S. investment and pay a special bonus to our U.S. employees.”

When it reported its fourth-quarter 2017 financials, AT&T said that tax reform helped boost the quarter’s net income to $19 billion, compared to $2.4 billion in the same period a year before.

AT&T gave out those $1,000 bonuses —  $200 million in bonus payments total — and $800 million in funding to its employee and retiree medical trust, Richter says.

But it also announced 1,540 layoffs across the U.S. in December, the union says. Layoffs included more than 430 call center workers. Others affected were technicians, with the largest group (590) being installation technicians who set up equipment in customer homes, the union says.

Over the past two years, the company has closed four call centers in Michigan and Ohio, the union says, and has laid off 2,300 workers in the past three years in Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin.

AT&T is adjusting its workforce in parts of the country where it’s seeing lower demand for legacy services such as landline and DSL services, AT&T’s Richter says, and adding workers where there’s increased demand for products and services.

At a call center in Appleton, Wis., where 400 employees worked three years ago, now only about 30 workers remain. Those workers constantly worry about their own jobs being cut, says Betsy LaFontaine, a union member who has worked there for almost 30 years. “What frustrates me is, at the end of the year when the tax law changed, … there were promises there was going to be investment, domestic job growth and they were going to expand infrastructure,” she said. “At this particular point, it seems that promise is being broken, based on what is going on in the negotiations.”

The union membership has authorized a strike if negotiations on the contract, which expired April 14, do not prove fruitful.

“They are looking for the cheapest possible labor handling sensitive information,” LaFontaine said. 

In 2015, AT&T paid $25 million as part of a settlement with the Federal Communications Commission into breaches at its call centers in Colombia, Mexico and the Philippines. Other countries with AT&T call centers include Canada, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic and Jamaica.

AT&T has, in the past, agreed to bring back some outsourced jobs during negotiations with the CWA. These included negotiations last year involving 3,000 jobs at AT&T Southwest, the union notes. And two years ago, an agreement with CWA and Verizon brought back 1,300 call center jobs in the northeast and mid-Atlantic states.

“We certainly know that technology will change things,” Hinton said, “but it shouldn’t for the American worker actually when we can be trained to do it.”

Follow USA TODAY reporter Mike Snider on Twitter: @MikeSnider.

Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2Hq5ItG

GARY SEMAN JR. THISWEEKNEWS.COM @ThisWeekGary

The 1400 Food Lab is firing on all cylinders.

Better make that burners.

The food-service incubator has added Sunday suppers, additional cooking classes and ticketed events — both pop-ups and formal dinners — at the 16,000-square-foot facility, 1400 Dublin Road in Columbus near Marble Cliff.

“We call ourselves a food-experience center,” general manager Karen Chrestay said.

Recent events at the facility include a tutorial on how to make Chinese soup dumplings with Helen Jiao of Helen’s Asian Kitchen in Northland and the Odd Bits & Offal dinner that showcased nine dishes prepared by present and former clients of the Food Lab using mostly Ohio ingredients and a mixologist who paired crafted cocktails with every dish. (For the uninitiated, offal parts are those often overlooked by today’s diners, illustrated by the menu that included such dishes as pork-tongue tacos and cheek-meat empanadas, spiced lamb-neck stew, braised oxtail, confit of pigtail and bone-marrow creme brulee.)

The Food Lab’s push forward started last year when the facility, founded in 2014, was purchased by Kitchen Mgmt Group. Improvements have included the acquisition of a liquor license and a revamped, upscale dining setting that can seat up to 56, Chrestay said.

Registered clients now rent licensed kitchen space by the hour, she said. Part of that cost includes cold and dry storage and equipment.

“We feel like this group of chefs is the next big wave, the up-and-coming of Columbus, in our opinion,” she said. “These are people you’re going to see a lot.”

At 3:30 p.m. every Thursday, the venue is open to tours to welcome fledgling or established food-service professionals, from food-truck owners to those looking to bottle their own sauces.

“Everybody has an idea for a food business, Chrestay said.

For most events, registration is required and admission is charged.

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Another shop offering rolled ice cream has opened in northwest Columbus.

Wali Dessert, 1440 Bethel Road in the Bethel Center, has five flavors of rolled ice cream — made from a liquid mixture that is poured on a cold slab and, as it freezes, rolled into small “logs” — but that’s not all.

Owner David Ye said fresh is the byword at Wali, where an open kitchen provides customers an opportunity to see food and drinks being made and fresh fruit, which accompanies many of the items, being cut per order.

“Customers can see it’s better,” Ye said.

The menu includes fresh juices, milk tea, bubble tea, smoothies and a few other less common treats, such as drinks covered with a tangy liquid cream cheese.

The dessert section has an Asian flair, with mango puree with rice balls and ice cream as a prime example.

Homemade crepes, stacked 15 high and interspersed with cake icing, also are among the top choices. One version features a dusting of matcha powder. Menu items are priced $4.75 to $7.95.

gseman@thisweeknews.com

@ThisWeekGary