Word: dismalness
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...think [the election of Blacks to the council] would happen in a city-wide [plurality] election," says Sullivan, pointing to the dismal chances of a Black being elected to Boston's city council despite the fact that it has a larger Black population. Eight of Boston's city councilors are elected through their wards, four are elected city-wide...
...tradition of summer vacations -- dating back to a time when family labor was vital to the late-summer harvest -- that give the U.S. one of the shortest school years in the industrialized world. There is surely a connection, a growing number of reformers argue, between that distinction and the dismal academic performances of American students, compared with their peers elsewhere...
With calculated harshness, the Italian government resorted to drastic measures in dealing with more than 18,000 impoverished Albanian refugees in the southern port of Bari. Seeking escape from the dismal conditions back home, the Albanians had fought their way ashore after crossing the Adriatic on grossly overcrowded boats, only to be penned into coal docks and the local soccer stadium without adequate food or water. The angry men and women then proceeded to wreck the stadium. Later, when supplies did arrive, complained a Caritas relief worker, "the police threw food at them like...
Americans quiz their kids more than anyone else in the world: 46 million students from kindergarten through high school are subjected to more than 150 million standardized tests each year. The results of that exercise seem dismal. Only 5% of U.S. high school seniors are deemed able to pursue higher mathematical study. By most measures, students in a variety of industrial countries continue to demonstrate that they know far more than their American peers about basics in history, science and reasoning. Who needs more tests...
...dismal U.S. retailing industry, home-improvement centers that sell everything from kitchen cabinets to grass seed have been a notable bright spot. Spurred by the spreading do-it-yourself itch, sales at the sprawling emporiums grew more than 10% a year in the 1980s, while retailing in general grew only about 6%. Even the stormy economy has held a silver lining for some companies, since people tend to fix up their homes rather than buy new ones during a downturn...