My campus has experienced a recent rash of thefts involving projectors. Today between 11 and 12 a projector was taken from the lecture bowl I use. The equipment (computers, DVD players, etc. ) are kept in cabinets that are locked (instructors have keys). An instructor left the projector cabinet open so the next instrutor would not have to go the trouble of unlocking and starting the equipment. I am guessing students in the class knew this was the typical pattern of behavior and one decided to liberate the projector (loosen a few bolts and broke a restraint of some kind). We had a similar experience in a classroom last semester – strange thing about that event was that the thief took the projector and left a laptop.
I bet this has something to do with a super bowl party. 🙁
Educators commonly express concern that students rely too heavily on web resources that have not been submitted to a formal editorial process. Even those who see the Internet as the library of the future recognize the uneven quality of web resources and suggest that students acquire a more critical eye as they select their sources.
My personal senstitivity to this educational issue provided a context for a story aired this evening on CNN. Scientists conducting research on climate change feel that editors have required modifications in their scientific papers regarding climate change that addressed global warming or climate change in way the scientists felt modified their intended conclusions (Union of Concerned Scientists Survey). One problematic finding indicated a differential rate of concerns editorial meddling between scientists working directly for the government and those funded by grants but working for independent organizations.
The mix of politics, science, and education can be problematic. One wonders if the “concern” generated regarding the showing of Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” would have surfaced had Gore not be recognizable as a politician.
“Condoms don’t belong in school, and neither does
Al Gore. He’s not a schoolteacher.”
I would think the documentary would be a great way to initiate a unit on the topic – make it part of a webquest and offer links to contrasting positions, have students search for commentary on the film and summarize contrasting views, etc. Perhaps in this case a little controversy could be a good thing.
I am posting this because some of you may be interested in higher ed positions and because the person hired will be my colleague.
The University of North Dakota Department of Teaching and Learning is seeking applications for an anticipated tenure-track position in Instructional Design & Technology (http://idt.und.edu) at the assistant or associate professor rank, contingent upon funding.
Responsibilities: teach graduate courses in Instructional Design & Technology, develop and maintain hybrid online/on-campus delivery, advise students, maintain active program of scholarly research & publication, and provide service to the university.
Qualifications: an earned doctorate in Instructional Design (ABD considered). Background in human-computer interaction, human-performance technology, interactive media, web-based instruction, and digital technologies helpful.
To apply: letter of application, curriculum vita, transcripts (unofficial accepted), and 3 letters of recommendation to: Glenn Olsen, Chair; Department of Teaching & Learning, Education Room 3, 231 Centennial Dr Stop 7189, Grand Forks, ND 58202-7189. Phone 701-777-3145. Fax: 701-777-3246. E-mail: glennolsen@mail.und.nodak.edu. Screening is immediate and continues until the position is filled. Position begins August 16, 2007.
UND is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer.
Andy Carvin has generated a very complete analysis of the new version of DOPA. Included in his post is a link to the text of the proposed bill as included in the Congressional Record. One frustrating change in the new bill is that it mashes together a variety of topics some of which would generate nearly universal support and others (e.g., objection to many commercial social networking tools) that in my opinion are questionable. I guess this is the way politicians like to play the game. Just for the record – I am against child pornography and predators of any type. I am also opposed to this bill because it lacks the sophistication to differentiate criminal behavior from constructive educational practices.
Andy’s post summarizes the description of social networking sites as a site that:
is offered by a commercial entity;
permits registered users to create an on-line profile that includes detailed personal information;
permits registered users to create an on-line journal and share such a journal with other users;
elicits highly-personalized information from users; and
enables communication among users.
Just for the record:
I am using my own software and server to offer this blog so it is not commercial. Many teachers would not have the opportunity or skill to create a blog of this type and under this bill would not be allowed to offer the content because they would be prevented from using convenient and free commercial blogging sites.
If anyone wants to go to the trouble, they can contribute to this blog by commenting on my posts. They would need to share some information before I would let them do this (I regard this commitment on their part as a security requirement). I could also allow others to generate original posts, but I do not. I would encourage them to create their own blog and we can link back and forth.
I would hope this blog enables communication among users.
I am not certain what eliciting highly-personal information means – is this one of those you know it when you see it standards?
It is true that the bill stipulates that school personal can use social software in situations that they supervise. I have previously explained that most teachers are not in a position to turn filters on and off at will. I would also suggest that the beauty of social software is that it reaches beyond school walls to involve others at other times and from other locations.
I walked into the office of a colleague the other day (the director of our IDT graduate program) and on his office table was a new Xserve blade and a Xserve raid (the Macintosh server with software and storage). Very nice equipment that will allow the IDT students to each have their own accounts and offer many terabytes of storage for streaming media.
“When are we going to have this system online,” I wanted to know. “I am waiting for someone to come to get everything up and running” was the reply.
So, I have been trying to estimate what this combination of hardware, software, and services was worth. Hard to know for certain. There were terabytes of storage in both the blade and the external RAID. The hardware had a very fast CPU. OS X server is not free and then someone was going to set up the entire thing.
I am in my “lab” on a Saturday morning working on my own server (the setup running this blog). It is a G-4 cast-off from a campus lab that I picked up as surplus. I use all open source software – the server, database, blog, and middleware software responsible for this blog and the other applications I run are free. Total cost = $0.
Clearly, I would not want to put my equipment up against the resources now available to the IDT students – no way the combination of software and hardware are close in terms of the users that can be serviced simultaneously, volume of content that can be streamed, storage capacity, etc. Still, $0 is $0 and I actually have and can continue to add more servers of the type I have described. Anything multiplied by $0 is still $0.
I happen to like operating my own hardware and software, but here is the other perspective on the cost issue. The other perspective would recognize that I am up here on Saturday morning. I am spending time doing things that would not be required of the users of more “ready-made” systems AND I have spent a considerable amount of time to get to the point that I am able to keep open source software operating. If I were not interesting in doing this “for fun” and say I was operating these same resources for a K-12 school, what would my time be worth?
My task this morning was to upgrade the blog software that serves the content you are viewing. If you are not familiar with open source, here is a description of why this singular task may be more complicated than you realize. To provide you access to my blog with free software, one of the challenges is to keep multiple free components synched (I don’t mean this as a technical term). The server software (Apache), the database storing blog “pieces” (MySQL), the middleware conntecting the database to the server and providing the processing necessary to assemble blog pages sent via the server (PHP), the blog software (WordPress) and blog software plugins (the add-ons that deal with spam, insert the tags, etc) are all continually upgraded. These upgrades make the software work more effectively and also reduce security threats. I could get everything working and then not mess with the new advances, but the university would be upset if I did not do what I could to reduce security problems. The challenge is that you have to deal with many separate parts and you have to be careful that the parts remain compatible. If you pay attention to only some of the pieces, you often find that the piece you have upgraded assumes a more current version of another piece and your upgrade has in some mysterious way “broken” the entire system. I don’t mean to make this sound impossible – everything went smoothly this morning. My purpose was to identify some challenges that are hidden in the use of open source software.
I learn a great deal doing what I do. I think acquiring the experiences I have allows me a different perspective on the way things work that those who rely on ready made apps simply do not have. Some may feel this knowledge is unnecessary for practitioners. It really is hard to say what is the best way to spend your time.
A week or so ago I outlined findings and recommendations from a report entitled tough choices or tough times. This report identified changing economic trends and recommended needed educational adjustments to prevent economic decline in the US.
Some states appear to be making a commitment to a similar combination of improved basic skills, a more focused set of goals, and 21st century skills. West Virginia (Technology and Learning article) has committed to such changes. However, what struck me in reading the description of the West Virginia approach was the way the approach was described. In contrast to Tough Choices or Tough Times there was much less of that “if you can’t do it we will find someone else” mentality. Of course, I am guessing the reimbursement model recommended in Tough Choices or Tough times will also not be in place. On the surface the goals seem very similar, the difference I suppose is assumptions about what are the sources of existing difficulties and what sort of changes must be made (tough choices) to create change.
BTW, the West Virginia specifically incorporates technology in the plan. I did not see that topic specifically addressed in the Skills of the American WorkForce recommendations.
I decided I was going to mark the uniqueness of this year’s State of the Union address by participating in a unique way. I have a CNN Pipeline account so I decided to watch via the Internet. Unfortunately, CNN decided to use the occasion of the event to allow anyone to try Pipeline. The consequences, at least for me, were not good. Normally, the video and sound come through with high quality. For the first part of the speech this evening, nothing worked. The feed constantly rebuffered allowing only a few seconds of video. About half way through things improved. I am thinking that most folks decided to try the trusty TV allowing those of us who were more stubborn the opportunity to use the net.
One can only imagine what direction variations on this type of application and opportunity might take. What about a digg-like system allowing a show of support or rejection following different claims or proposals?
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