Thousands of anti-violence protesters marched along a Chicago interstate on Saturday, shutting down traffic to draw attention to the gun violence that’s claimed hundreds of lives in some of the city’s poorest neighborhoods and pressure public officials to do more to stop it.

Marchers chanted, “Stop the killing,” and carried signs reading, “We need jobs,” and other messages. Some stopped to scrawl on the road with chalk: “Enough is enough” and “Peace.” Toward the front of the march the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a Roman Catholic priest on the city’s South Side who organized the protest; Chicago police Supt. Eddie Johnson; and the Rev. Jesse Jackson linked arms.

Read more at Associated Press News.

The 1-year-old boy in a green button-up shirt drank milk from a bottle, played with a small purple ball that lit up when it hit the ground and occasionally asked for “agua.”

Then it was the child’s turn for his court appearance before a Phoenix immigration judge, who could hardly contain his unease with the situation during the portion of the hearing where he asks immigrant defendants whether they understand the proceedings.

Read more at Associated Press News.

Florence, the capital of Tuscany, offers bits and pieces of everything travelers love about Italy as a whole. Art lovers will find some of the most well-known Renaissance architecture including the Duomo Cathedral, paintings from Sandro Botticelli and Leonardo Da Vinci and, of course, Michaelangelo's iconic David. Likewise, foodies and oenophiles will find antipasti, traditional pane (bread), pappardelle (long, wide pasta) and rich reds from nearby Chianti. With stunning sights and gastronomic indulgences around every bend, romance is — no surprise here — also at a premium. Whether you're traveling on business, taking the kiddos on their first European trip or looking for an intimate hideaway for your honeymoon, you'll find something favorable on this list. 

Read more at Trip Saavy.

Lance Wheeler looks at glassy skyscrapers and sees untapped potential. Houses and office buildings, he says, account for 75% of electricity use in the United States, and 40% of its energy use overall. Windows, because they leak energy, are a big part of the problem. "Anything we can do to mitigate that is going to have a very large impact," says Wheeler, a solar power expert at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado.

A series of recent results points to a solution, he says: Turn the windows into solar panels. In the past, materials scientists have embedded light-absorbing films in window glass. But such solar windows tend to have a reddish or brown tint that architects find unappealing. The new solar window technologies, however, absorb almost exclusively invisible ultraviolet (UV) or infrared light. That leaves the glass clear while blocking the UV and infrared radiation that normally leak through it, sometimes delivering unwanted heat. By cutting heat gain while generating power, the windows "have huge prospects," Wheeler says, including the possibility that a large office building could power itself.

Read more at Science Mag.

Since 1900, average life expectancy around the globe has more than doubled, thanks to better public health, sanitation and food supplies. But a new study of long-lived Italians indicates that we have yet to reach the upper bound of human longevity.

“If there’s a fixed biological limit, we are not close to it,” said Elisabetta Barbi, a demographer at the University of Rome. Dr. Barbi and her colleagues published their research Thursday in the journal Science.

Read more at The New York Times.

As word spread that an electric scooter rental company called Bird Rides Inc. was amassing $300 million from investors just months after its first birthday, one question has plagued onlookers in and outside Silicon Valley: Why?

Now that the Los Angeles-based startup has completed the massive financing effort, Bird founder Travis VanderZanden is ready to explain how he plans to spend all that money. Altogether Bird has raised $418 million since it was founded in April 2017. The company, which rents scooters out via a mobile application, has already launched in 15 cities and plans to add seven more in as many days. The company is also hiring a team in Europe for a potential scooter business there.

Read more at Bloomberg.

College isn't for everyone, an important fact to keep in mind when choosing a career. If you can't see yourself spending four years in school, earning a bachelor's degree, only consider occupations for which you don't need one. A vocational degree may provide the proper educational requirements.

What Is a Vocational Degree?

A vocational degree is an award an institution grants to an individual after he or she completes an intensive job training program. This course of study provides technical preparation for a specific career. One who undertakes it will acquire the skills needed to work in that trade or craft or be a technician.

Read more at The Balance Careers.

Your small business brand is like a business card that you present to the marketplace, making it clear who you are and what valuable goods and services you provide. When someone sees your brand you want them to associate it with positive experiences, great products and services, and quality, whether or not they had direct contact with your business. Branding is important to your business success, so you must be intentional about developing it. You could hire an expert and spend tens of thousands of dollars or put in the time and effort to do it yourself. DIY efforts can be very effective and easy on the budget if you know where to look.

Read more at Small Biz Trends.

It’s hailed as the one day in the year when members of the royal family come clean about their finances. At the end of June, the palace regularly opens up its books to public scrutiny when it publishes not just the report on how much the royal household has spent but also the financial results of the Duchy of Cornwall and the Crown Estate. In a year when the disclosure of the Queen’s and Prince Charles’s investments in offshore tax havens has been met with a deafening silence from their officials, a loosening of lips was long overdue.

Read more at The Guardian.

For many consumers, a perfect credit score is like a four-leaf clover. You know it exists. It’s just rare.

The FICO credit score model ranges from a low of 300 to a high of 850. Just 1.5 percent of scorable U.S. consumers earn an 850 as of this past April, according to Ethan Dornhelm, vice president of Scores and Predictive Analytics at FICO.

Each credit bureau report generates a score depending on the model used. The most widely used is FICO. So you can have more than one credit score depending on the credit file searched and the version of the scoring model used. I keep a constant watch on my scores, taking advantage of the many ways to view them for free. By the way, the scores given to consumers can differ from the ones used by lenders.

Read more at The Washington Post.