Rhode Island Education Commissioner Deborah Gist has built a robust reputation as a reformer, making Time magazine's 100 most influential list a couple of years back

The Ocean State's reform brand is neatly aligned with a national, free market-inspired approach - favored by the Obama White House on down - that focuses on building a better teacher and encouraging charter schools.

That's right. My cover story this week is on the Nads, the Rhode Island School of Design's club hockey team, and their mascot Scrotie - a giant, randy, foam-and-nylon penis.

This one, I must say, practically wrote itself: tales of Scrotie's tortured relationship with Clammy, the giant, vulva-like mascot of the rival Clams hockey team; stories of former Providence Mayor Buddy Cianci coaching for a night - brandy snifter in one hand and cigar in the other; I won't give away anymore.

Not for Nothing is back after a New Year's hiatus. Happy 2012, people. A few political/media notes and Occupy ruminations as we get back into the swing of things:

• Darrell West, the former Brown University political science professor now with the Brookings Institution will be speaking on the presidential election this Saturday, January 7, at the Newport Museum of Art at 2 p.

In this week's Phoenix, I've got a cover story on Brown University's Political Theory Project, which is right in the thick of an intriguing effort to bring a balanced political debate to one of the nation's most liberal campuses.

The institute caught my eye when I stumbled upon an online reference to one of its funders: Charles G.

Technology problems kept me off the blog yesterday. But I'm back with a belated take on Geoffrey Canada, who was the headline speaker at a well-attended Family Service of Rhode Island fundraiser at the Rhode Island Convention Center yesterday

Canada is the charismatic figure behind the Harlem Children's Zone, a sweeping effort to transform the lives of some 10,000 children in a 97-block area of Manhattan.

The death of Steve Jobs has inspired reflection nationwide. I spoke, this afternoon, with RISD President John Maeda, who has done plenty of thinking about technology and design - and Jobs's special place at their intersection. The interview is edited and condensed.

WHAT DOES THE DEATH OF STEVE JOBS HIGHLIGHT FOR THE REST OF US ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF DESIGN? I think it's making us think what design is all about.

Last week, I sat down with Governor Chafee for an interview on several topics. I've written, in this space, about his comments on medical marijuana. But there were other quotes of note, too.

Last month in a story on organized labor I reported that reamortizing the state's pension obligation - refinancing and kicking some of the problem down the road - was still part of the behind-the-scenes conversation on pension reform, even if the idea had largely disappeared from the public discourse.

A fun cover story in this week's Phoenix. The University of Rhode Island's 49th Annual Honors Colloquium, a speakers series and class, is titled "Are You Ready for the Future?" And the speaker who kicked off the event was Ray Kurzweil, a brilliant inventor - and media favorite - who says exponential growth in technological sophistication means we'll all be having sex with robots, running at Olympic speeds and, achieving immortality in the very near future.

Interesting tableau in Washington, today, with Governor Lincoln Chafee and Education Commissioner Deborah Gist, who have clashed in the past, playing witness - together - to President Obama's announcement of changes to the No Child Left Behind regime.

The president is offering states waivers from from NCLB's 2014 deadline for meeting testing targets in exchange for a commitment to tougher teacher evaluation systems and overhauls of low-performing schools - central planks of the Obama education agenda.

The state's Board of Regents shot down a proposed Cranston charter school today, by a 7-1 vote, after a heated debate that pitted Cranston Mayor Allan Fung and the state's school reform movement against the Cranston school committee and teachers unions.

Fung and the reformers said the proposed school, a so-called "mayoral academy," was a vital step toward improving education for the most at-risk students.

Don't worry, I'm not talking about the Vancouver looters. No, I'm talking about Geoffrey Canada who is, to my mind, one of the most intriguing figures of our time.

Canada runs Harlem Children's Zone, which provides intense social and educational supports - "cradle-to-college" - for 10,000 children in a 100-block section of New York City's Harlem neighborhood.

Providence Superintendent Tom Brady's resignation has already ginned up all sorts of speculation over who may replace him. But if the "who" is important, so is the "what," as in what sort of philosophy can we expect - what sort of approach to teachers and education reform in a remarkably turbulent time in capital city education.

Amid all the debate here and across the country on education reform, the teacher's defense:

Steve Smith, president of the Providence Teachers Union, has been a pivotal figure in Rhode Island's education reform movement. He has joined with Providence Superintendent Tom Brady in a unique labor-management partnership to turn around failing schools - a model that has won national attention. And he provided a key bit of support in the state's successful, reform-minded application for $75 million in federal Race to the Top dollars.

Governor Chafee's nominee for chairman of the state school board, George Caruolo, did little to ease the anxiety of the school reform crowd with an interview that appeared on the front page of the Providence Journal today.

Caruolo's call for a pragmatic approach - for a slowing down of the relentless reform push of Education Commissioner Deborah Gist - puts him firmly in line with the governor who nominated him.