Tidbits on September 27, 2011
Bob Jensen
at Trinity University
Our cottage was at one time a
part of the historic Sunset Hill Hotel Resort
This week I feature a brochure revealing part of the history of this resort and
our cottage
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/CottageHistory/Hotel/Brochure/Brochure1900.htm
Question
Why did these grand resorts of New England and Canada play out in the latter
half of the 20th Century after thriving for 100-200 years in the windy
mountains, cold lakes, and the Atlantic Ocean's shore?
Answer
See my commentary at the bottom of
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/CottageHistory/Hotel/Brochure/Brochure1900.htm
More of Bob Jensen's Pictures and
Stories
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
Blogs of White
Mountain Hikers (many great photographs) ---
http://www.blogger.com/profile/02242409292439585691
Especially note
the archive of John Compton's blogs at the bottom of the page at
http://1happyhiker.blogspot.com/
Question
Are their trails in our White Mountains of New Hampshire that have ice in summer
as well as winter?
See "The Ice Gulch, Would I do it Again" by John Compton, August 5, 2011 ---
http://1happyhiker.blogspot.com/2011_08_05_archive.html
Okay, you might ask, is there
really ice in the Ice Gulch, even in August? Yes, there is! The next photo
shows one small patch of ice. There were many larger patches, but they were
at the bottom of some of those deep gaps that I mentioned above. I took some
photos, but none of them really turned out, even with using a flash to
illuminate these dark, dank, deep spots.
White
Mountain News ---
http://www.whitemtnews.com/
Added Personal Note
Erika broke two rods attached to her lower spine that are now digging painfully
into her spinal cord.
On September 29, 2011 she will have her 15th spine surgery
Please pray that she will at last recover from her spinal injury and surgery ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Erika2007.htm
Tidbits on September 27, 2011
Bob Jensen
For earlier editions of Tidbits go to
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
For earlier editions of New Bookmarks go to
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm
Click here to search Bob Jensen's web site if you have key words to enter ---
Search Site.
For example if you want to know what Jensen documents have the term "Enron"
enter the phrase Jensen AND Enron. Another search engine that covers Trinity and
other universities is at
http://www.searchedu.com/.
Bob Jensen's past presentations and lectures
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/resume.htm#Presentations
Bob Jensen's Threads ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm
Bob Jensen's Home Page is at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/
Online Video, Slide Shows, and Audio
In the past I've provided links to various types of music and video available
free on the Web.
I created a page that summarizes those various links ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm
NOVA: Evolution [Flash Player] ---
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/
What It Feels Like to Fly Over Planet Earth ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/what_it_feels_like_to_fly_over_planet_earth.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Video
"Debt: The First 5,000 Years," by Paul Kedrosky , Kedrosky.com, September 10,
2011 ---
Click Here
http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2011/09/debt-the-first-5000-years.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+InfectiousGreed+%28Paul+Kedrosky%27s+Infectious+Greed%29
TEDxSF - Louie Schwartzberg - Gratitude ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXDMoiEkyuQ
The Making of a Nazi: Disney’s 1943 Animated Short ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/the_making_of_a_nazi_disney.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
The 9/11 Memorial ---
Click Here
http://d.yimg.com/nl/ynews/newsmaker/player.html#shareUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.yahoo.com%2Fvideo%23video%3D26271274&vid=26271274&browseCarouselUI=hide
American Flight 11
In My Seat ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLj4akmncsA&feature=youtu.be
Remote Control Roundup (why cowboys are now unemployed) ---
http://www.youtube.com/embed/NA-ST8nXl4U?rel=0
Richard Dawkins Introduces His New Illustrated Book, The Magic
of Reality ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/richard_dawkins_introduces_his_new_illustrated_book_ithe_magic_of_realityi.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Whose Line Is It Anyway? The Complete Improv Series Now Free
Online ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/whose_line_is_it_anyway_improv_series_free_online.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
National Science Foundation: Disasters [Flash Player] ---
http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/disasters/index.jsp
Dangerous Knowledge: 4 Brilliant Mathematicians & Their Drift
to Insanity ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/dangerous_knowledge_4_brilliant_mathematicians_their_drift_to_insanity.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Physics to go videos ---
http://www.physics.org/article-interact.asp?id=59
125 Great Science Videos: From Astronomy to Physics & Psychology ---
http://www.openculture.com/science_videos
Patriot Guard Riders Drown Out Uncaring Fanatic Westboro
Baptist Church Protesters (must watch to the end) ---
http://www.breitbart.tv/patriot-guard-riders-drown-out-westboro-baptist-church-protesters/
Also see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westboro_Baptist_Church
Free music downloads ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm
Web Site Story ---
http://www.collegehumor.com/moogaloop/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1913584&fullscreen=1
A virtual choir 2,000 voices strong (must watch
to the end) ---
http://www.wimp.com/choirvoices/
At some point in time, no live choir will be able to rival a virtual choir
You can
also Google Eric Whitacre if you would like to view the entire musical piece.
Sound And Silence: 'Remembering Sept. 11' At The
Temple Of Dendur (complete concert) ---
http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/
Iowa Digital Library: Stradivari String Quartet
Recordings ---
http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/strad
'Remember To Love': A Sept. 11 Concert From
Trinity Church, NYC (Concert Part 1) ---
http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2011/09/06/140221544/remembering-sept-11-at-trinity-church-nyc
A Romantic Sensation: 'Lucia Di Lammermoor'
(Introduction to the Opera) ---
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/09/140333090/a-romantic-sensation-lucia-di-lammermoor
'Porgy And Bess,' Adapted For Modern Times ---
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/13/140332015/porgy-and-bess-adapted-for-modern-times
The Austin City Limits Music Festival & Miles
Davis Streaming Online ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/the_austin_city_limits_music_festival_miles_davis_streaming_online.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Greatest Dance Scenes 1921 - 2010! ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Tx9mcZldQXU
Andre' Rieu's YouTube Channel ---
http://www.youtube.com/AndreRieuTV
There Should Be More Happiness (good jam session
after a slow beginning) ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=oXvJ8UquYoo&vq=large
Time to Say Goodbye (The Dubai Fountain cost
US$218 million) ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=jD69C0y6_J0
When You Feel Like You've Had Enough ---
http://dingo.care2.com/cards/flash/5409/galaxy.swf
Copenhagen Flash Mob at the train station -
Philamonic Orchestra plays Ravel's Bolero ---
http://snipurl.com/bolerocopehnagen
http://www.classicalarchives.com/feature/dont_miss_this.html?utm_content=omega12340comcast.net&utm_source=VerticalResponse&utm_medium=Email&utm_term=Explore%20Flash%20Mob%20in%20Copenhagen%26nbsp%3B&utm_campaign=Classical%20Archives%20Newsletter%20-%20August%2010%2C%202011content
Web outfits like
Pandora, Foneshow, Stitcher, and Slacker broadcast portable and mobile content
that makes Sirius look overpriced and stodgy ---
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2009/tc20090327_877363.htm?link_position=link2
TheRadio (my favorite commercial-free
online music site) ---
http://www.theradio.com/
Slacker (my second-favorite commercial-free online music site) ---
http://www.slacker.com/
Gerald Trites likes this
international radio site ---
http://www.e-radio.gr/
Songza:
Search for a song or band and play the selection ---
http://songza.com/
Also try Jango ---
http://www.jango.com/?r=342376581
Sometimes this old guy prefers the jukebox era (just let it play through) ---
http://www.tropicalglen.com/
And I listen quite often to Soldiers Radio Live ---
http://www.army.mil/fieldband/pages/listening/bandstand.html
Also note U.S. Army Band recordings
---
http://bands.army.mil/music/default.asp
Bob Jensen listens to music free online (and no commercials)
---
http://www.slacker.com/
Photographs and Art
The National Gallery: Virtual Tour ---
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/visiting/virtualtour/
The Aurora Borealis Viewed from Orbit (and What
Creates Those Northern Lights?) ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/aurora_borealis_from_orbit.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
The Largest Black Holes in the Universe: A Visual
Introduction ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/the_largest_black_holes_in_the_universe.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
TEDxSF - Louie Schwartzberg - Gratitude ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXDMoiEkyuQ
A Treasury of World's Fair Art & Architecture ---
http://digital.lib.umd.edu/worldsfairs/?pid=umd:2
The Cave of Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc (archaeology) ---
http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/arcnat/chauvet/en/index.html
Images from University of Illinois at Chicago
Library Collections (photograph archive) ---
http://library.uic.edu/home/collections/images/images-from-uic-library-collections
Neue Gallerie: Online Collection (Germany, Austria) ---
http://www.neuegalerie.org/collection
University of Illinois at Navy Pier Photographs (1945-1948)
---
Click Here
http://photo.lib.uic.edu/cgi-bin/store/imageFolio.cgi?direct=University_Library_Collections/Historic_UIC_photos/Navy_Pier_Campus&img=
Historic Houston Photographs ---
http://digital.lib.uh.edu/cdm4/about_collection.php?CISOROOT=/p15195coll2
Educational Comics Collection ---
http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/edcomics
Earth From Above ---
http://justpaste.it/3ky
The Willard Suitcase Exhibit Online (psychiatric, psychiatry,
mental illness) ---
http://www.suitcaseexhibit.org/indexhasflash.html
Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets,
Caskets, and Cases (art history, sculpture) ---
http://goo.gl/hkMmX
The City That Time Forgot ---
http://vlm32.com/savedHTML_2/thecitythattimeforgot.html
Bob Jensen's threads on history, literature and art ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#History
Online Books, Poems, References, and Other Literature
In the past I've provided links to various
types electronic literature available free on the Web.
I created a page that summarizes those various links ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm
Atlas of Rural and Small-Town America ---
http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/ruralatlas/
Free Online Textbooks, Videos, and Tutorials ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks
Free Tutorials in Various Disciplines ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Tutorials
Edutainment and Learning Games ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Edutainment
Open Sharing Courses ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
Now in Another Tidbits Document
Political Quotations on September 27, 2011
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2011/TidbitsQuotations092711.htm
The booked National
Debt on September 27, 2011 was over $14 trillion ---
U.S. National Debt Clock ---
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
Video on "Capitalism at Risk," by Dutch Leonard and Lynn Paine,
Harvard Business Review Blog, September 2011 ---
Click Here
http://blogs.hbr.org/video/2011/09/capitalism-at-risk.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date
The January 2010 Booked National Debt Plus Unbooked Entitlements Debt
The GAO estimated $76 trillion Present Value in January 2010 unless something
drastic is done.
Click Here |
http://www.pgpf.org/~/media/PGPF/Media/PDF/2010/03/fiscalsustainabilityGAONationsLongTermFiscalOutlook03032010.ashx?pid={97E10657-8193-4455-871C-4E7A6A9EE084}
There are many ways to describe the
federal government’s long-term fiscal challenge. One method for capturing
the challenge in a single number is to measure the “fiscal gap.” The fiscal
gap represents the difference, or gap, between revenue and spending in
present value terms over a certain period, such as 75 years, that would need
to be closed in order to achieve a specified debt level (e.g., today’s debt
to GDP ratio) at the end of the period.2 From the fiscal gap, one can
calculate the size of action needed—in terms of tax increases, spending
reductions, or, more likely, some combination of the two—to close the gap;
that is, for debt as a share of GDP to equal today’s ratio at the end of the
period. For example, under our Alternative simulation, the fiscal gap is 9.0
percent of GDP (or a little over $76 trillion in present value dollars) (see
table 2). This means that revenue would have to increase by about 50 percent
or noninterest spending would have to be reduced by 34 percent on average
over the next 75 years (or some combination of the two) to keep debt at the
end of the period from exceeding its level at the beginning of 2010 (53
percent of GDP).
Peter G.
Peterson Website on Deficit/Debt Solutions ---
http://www.pgpf.org/
Bob Jensen's health care messaging updates ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm
Smart About Money - National Endowment for Financial Education ---
http://www.smartaboutmoney.org/
Bob Jensen's personal finance helpers ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/BookBob1.htm#InvestmentHelpers
"15 Years of Cutting-Edge Thinking on
Understanding the Mind," Edited by Maria Popova, The Atlantic,
September 14, 2011 ---
http://www.theatlantic.com/life/archive/2011/09/15-years-of-cutting-edge-thinking-on-understanding-the-mind/245006/
Bringing Jonathan Haidt, Martin Seligman, Alison Gopnik, Steven Pinker,
Philip Zimbardo, and others together between two covers
For the past 15 years,
literary-agent-turned-crusader-of-human-progress John Brockman has been a
remarkable curator of curiosity, long before either "curator" or "curiosity"
was a frivolously tossed around buzzword. His
Edge.org
has become an epicenter of bleeding-edge insight
across science, technology and beyond, hosting conversations with some of
our era's greatest thinkers (and, once a year,
asking them some big questions). Last month marked
the release of
The Mind, the first volume in The Best of
Edge Series, presenting eighteen provocative, landmark pieces --
essays, interviews, transcribed talks -- from the Edge archive. The
anthology reads like a who's who of Brain Pickings favorites across
psychology, evolutionary biology, social science, technology, and more. And,
perhaps equally interestingly, the tome -- most of the materials in which
are available for free online -- is an implicit manifesto for the enduring
power of books as curatorial capsules of ideas. Brockman writes in the
book's introduction:
While there's no doubt
about the value of online presentations, the role of books, whether
bound and printed or presented electronically, is still an invaluable
way to present important ideas. Thus, we are pleased to be able to offer
this series of books to the public.
Here's a small
sampling of the treasure chest between
The Mind's covers:
In "Eudaemonia: The
Good Life" (2004), Martin Seligman, father of positive psychology whom you
might recall as the author of
Flourish and
Learned Optimism, one of our
7 essential books on optimism, explores what he
calls the "third form of happiness," which lies in:
...knowing what your
highest straights are and deploying those in the service of something
you believe in is larger than you are. There's no shortcut to that.
That's what life is about. There will likely be a pharmacology of
pleasure, and there may be a pharmacology of positive emotion generally,
but it's unlikely there'll be an interesting pharmacology of flow. And
it's impossible that there'll be a pharmacology of meaning.
In "Moral Psychology
and the Misunderstanding of Religion" (2007), psychologist Jonathan Haidt
(whose
The Happiness Hypothesis you might recall as
one of our
7 favorite books on happiness) notes:
[I]t might seem obvious to
you that contractual societies are good, modern, creative, and free,
whereas beehive societies reek of feudalism, fascism, and patriarchy.
And, as a secular liberal I agree that contractual societies such as
those of Western Europe offer the best hope for living peacefully
together in our increasingly diverse modern nations (although it remains
to be seen if Europe can solve its current diversity problems). I just
want to make one point, however, that should give constructualists
pause: surveys have long shown that religious believers in the United
States are happier, healthier, longer-lived, and more generous to
charity and to each other than are secular people.
In
"Amazing Babies" (2009), psychologist and philosopher Alison
Gopnik laid the foundations for her
The Philosophical Baby, one
of this year's
must-read books by TED Global speakers:
We've known
for a long time that human children are the best
learning machines in the universe, but it has always
been like the mystery of the hummingbirds. We know that
they fly, but we don't know how they can possibly do it.
We could say that babies learn, but we didn't know how.
Harvard's Steven Pinker, whose illuminating insights on
violence and human nature you
might recall and who penned one of our
5 favorite books on language,
wrote in "Organs of Computation" (1997), long before the
hype of contemporary quasi-sciences like neuromarketing:
Most of the
assumptions about the mind that underlie current
discussions are many decades out of date. [L]ook at the
commentaries on human affairs by pundits and social
critics. They say we're 'conditioned' to do this, or
'brainwashed' to do that, or 'socialized' to believe
such and such. Where do these ideas come from? From the
behaviorism of the 1920s, from bad Cold War movies from
the 1950s, from folklore about the effects of family
upbringing that behavior genetics has shown to be false.
The basic understanding that the human mind is a
remarkably complex processor of information, an 'organ
of extreme perfection and complication,' to use Darwin's
phrase, has not made it into the mainstream of
intellectual life.
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's threads on metacognition are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/265wp.htm
Open (Free) Textbooks: Computer Science ---
http://www.collegeopentextbooks.org/opentextbookcontent/open-textbooks-by-subject/computerscience.html
Bob Jensen's threads about open sharing lectures, materials, courses, and
videos ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
The Floating University ---
http://www.floatinguniversity.com/
Thank you Ramesh Fernando for the heads up.
Steven Pinker speaks about the personal rewards that come from
learning big ideas ---
http://www.floatinguniversity.com/learn-more-individuals
You don't need to be a student enrolled
at a traditional college or university to take a Floating University
course with some of the greatest professors from around the world. Not
only is
Great Big Ideas available to anyone, anywhere, but lifelong learners
who
subscribe now will have to the opportunity to take the course this
fall semester alongside students from Harvard, Yale, and Bard.
Get More Than Just a Class.
- Learn for the Joy of
Learning. No homework. No tests. Just the vital knowledge,
in compelling formats, directly from today's leading educators and
practitioners.
- No reading required.
Follow the same syllabus as students taking the course for credit,
or simply watch the highly produced video lectures.
- Flexible. Watch
the lectures whenever you want, wherever you want.
Enrollment in
Great Big Ideas includes:
- 12 hours of Floating University
lectures, released throughout the Fall 2011 semester. (You'll get to
take the course alongside students who are currently enrolled in
university.)
- A course syllabus including
suggested and related readings.*
- Exclusive access to each lecture's
online discussion board.
- Notes for every lecture and
reading.
- Additional perspectives on each
lecture from outside experts.
- Course access for 6 months (from
date of sign-up).
Bob Jensen's threads on free lectures, videos, and course materials from
prestigious universities ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
"Psychology’s Treacherous Trio: Confirmation Bias, Cognitive Dissonance,
and Motivated Reasoning," by sammcnerney, Why We Reason, September 7,
2011 ---
Click Here
http://whywereason.wordpress.com/2011/09/07/psychologys-treacherous-trio-confirmation-bias-cognitive-dissonance-and-motivated-reasoning/
The Digital Revolution and Higher Education ---
http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/College-presidents.aspx
"North Carolina State U. Physics Prof Wins a McGraw Prize for
Digital Teaching," by Marc Parry, Chronicle of Higher Education, September
21, 2011 ---
Click Here
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/north-carolina-state-u-physics-prof-wins-a-mcgraw-prize-for-digital-teaching/33334?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
A North Carolina State University physics professor
was honored today as one of three winners of the 2011 Harold W. McGraw, Jr.
Prize in Education. The professor, Robert Beichner, “has changed how
students learn in the science classroom” through the SCALE-UP project,
described as “an approach that uses digital technology combined with
innovative teaching approaches centered on hands-on activities and
round-table discussions.” More than 100 colleges have adopted the strategy.
The other two winners of the McGraw prize were cited for their work in
pre-K, elementary, and secondary education: Mitchel Resnick, professor of
learning research at the MIT Media Lab, and Julie Young, president of the
Florida Virtual School.
Bob Jensen's threads on Education Technology ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm
"A Philosophy of Teaching," by Rob Jenkins, Chronicle of Higher
Education, September 20, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/A-Philosophy-of-Teaching/129060/
Most teaching statements are written by people
who—let's be honest—don't really know that much about teaching. Usually the
writers are first-time job seekers with, at best, a year or two as a
graduate assistant or an adjunct under their belts.
Battle-scarred classroom veterans, unless they
happen to be going on the market, rarely write a statement of teaching
philosophy. But maybe they should.
My philosophy of teaching has been forged over more
than 32 years, 26 of those as an instructor. As a student, I attended a
private liberal-arts college and a midsized regional university. I've taught
at a large land-grant university, a small rural community college, a large
metropolitan community college, and a suburban technical college.
Like everyone in the profession, I came to the job
with a number of preconceived notions, based partly on observations of my
own teachers, both good and bad, and partly on my perception of how things
should operate in a perfect world. Most of those notions proved false or
impractical, and the jury is still out on the rest.
In addition, since I also spent 11 years
supervising faculty members, my teaching philosophy has been profoundly
influenced by my experiences with colleagues. I've had the great good
fortune to observe and learn from some of the best teachers in the world.
I've also known a few faculty members whose chief contribution to my
development was to strengthen my resolve never—ever—to do certain
things.
Please note that in sharing my philosophy, I'm not
suggesting that it's the definitive approach or encouraging anyone else to
adopt it. I'm simply sharing what I've come to believe.
College students are adults. I
wrote about that truism in some depth back in August of 2010 ("Welcome
to My Classroom"), but it bears revisiting as one
element of a more comprehensive philosophy.
People tend to rise or fall to the level that is
expected of them. Make it clear that you think students are stupid and, odds
are, they will underperform. Act like you expect them to misbehave, and your
classroom will probably resemble a war zone. But if you tell students
upfront that you consider them to be adults, and then treat them
accordingly, most will attempt to live up to the label. That's certainly
been the case in my classroom over the years.
Treating students like adults means you allow them
the freedoms that adults enjoy—to be late for class, for instance, to miss
it altogether, or to leave early if that's what they need to do. At the same
time, you make it clear that, as adults, they are responsible for all the
material in the course, whether or not they were in class on a particular
day.
That approach has profound implications for every
aspect of classroom management, from discipline to attendance to late
papers. Students like it because they think of themselves as adults and
appreciate being viewed that way. (College students despise few things more
than being treated as though they were still in high school.) And it's good
for professors because it shifts the responsibility for "keeping up" onto
the students, where it belongs.
Teaching is performance art. I
wish I had coined that phrase, or at least knew who did. I just know that it
has become one of my foundational beliefs.
The concept of the teacher as performer, as "the
sage on the stage," has fallen out of favor in recent years. But the fact
is, we are sages and we are on a stage. How we perform—that is, how we
teach—is every bit as important as what we teach.
Moreover, how our students respond to us—and by
extension, to our subject matter—depends largely on the quality of the
performance we give in class, day in and day out. Want to engage your
students, capture their interest, motivate them to do more and be more? Then
pay attention to voice inflection and body language, just as an actor would.
Practice your timing. Play to your audience. Inject some humor. Entertain.
That doesn't mean you have to make yourself the
focal point of the classroom all the time. Class discussions, group work,
and other non-teacher-centric strategies can also be effective. But when the
curtain goes up and it's your time to shine, go out there and knock 'em
dead.
Great teachers may be born, but good
teachers are made. The ability to become a great teacher—one who
inspires students and seems to connect with them effortlessly—is a gift, an
innate talent like musical ability or athletic prowess.
Just like any other gift, it can either be
squandered or put to good use. The very best teachers are those who have the
gift and have worked hard over many years to further develop it—although we
often overlook the hard work because they make being a great teacher look so
easy.
Continued in article
Differences between "popular teacher" versus "master teacher" versus
"mastery learning" versus "master educator" ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/assess.htm#Teaching
Bob Jensen's threads on metacognitive teaching and learning ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/265wp.htm
"Who Are YOU (as a teacher)?" by Joe Hoyle, Teaching Blog,
September 14, 2011 ---
http://joehoyle-teaching.blogspot.com/2011/09/who-are-you.html
Joe lists some famous persons in history that you might try to emulate ---
but that might not be you.
There are also the best of the best according to RateMyProfessor ---
http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/topLists11/topLists.html
Accounting Professor Lawrie Gardner comes in at Rank 21 among community
college teachers ---
http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=390728
Video of how "You" might improve your image with new pairs of shoes
Dr. Kimora of John Jay College, the #2 Highest Rated Professor on
RateMyProfessors.com, responds to your comments on Professors Strike
Back! ---
http://blog.ratemyprofessors.com/professor-kimora-john-jay-college/#more-2192
Back to School: Free Resources for Lifelong Learners Everywhere ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/back_to_school_free_resources_for_lifelong_learners_everywhere.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Free Video Lecture: Globalization of Capital Flows
Taught by Professor Timothy Taylor, Macalester College M.Econ., Stanford
University
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/special/CapitalFlowsFreeLecture.aspx
Optimizing Brain Fitness: Free Video Lecture on How Your Brain Works
Taught by Dr. Richard Restak, The George Washington University School of
Medicine and Health Sciences
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/special/optimizing-brain-fitness.aspx
The Great Courses ---
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/greatcourses.aspx
Most of these are not free courses, but this company makes money because of
lecture quality
Bob Jensen's threads on free lectures and videos and course materials from
prestigious universities
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
"JSTOR Opens Up U.S. Journal Content From Before 1923," by Jennifer
Howard, Chronicle of Higher Education, September 7, 2011 ---
Users anywhere now have free access to JSTOR’s
Early Journal Content, a corpus of scholarly
articles published in the United States before 1923 and elsewhere before
1870. That’s about 500,000 articles from 200 journals, according to JSTOR’s
announcement.
The digital archive said it encourages “broad use”
of the material but asked that users not use “robots or other devices to
systematically download these works as this may be disruptive to our
systems.” In the announcement, Laura Brown, JSTOR’s managing director, said
the move was not prompted by a much-publicized incident this year involving
Aaron Swartz, a hacktivist charged with violations
related to making unauthorized downloads of millions of JSTOR files.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
This is good news for historians, although most faculty and students have "free"
access due to their college library subscriptions. It won't open up The
Accounting Review oldies since, as I recall, TAR commenced in 1925 after a
heated dispute over accountics. Accountics lost until about 1960 when it's
takeover of TAR commenced (former TAR Senior Editor's Steve Kachelmeiers rough
estimated percentage on the AECM for recent years was a 99% quantitative methods
dominance).
A great listing of TAR articles (throughout its history) and other AAA
publications is provided by James Martin in MAAW ---
http://maaw.info/AAAMain.htm
Here's a brief history of the early years of TAR ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/395wpTAR/Web/TAR395wp.htm
"Traders Gone Rogue: A Greatest-Hits Album," by Thomas Kaplan, The
New York Times, September 15, 2011 ---
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/09/15/traders-gone-rogue-a-greatest-hits-album/
Traders run amok are often sentenced to pay
restitution, in addition to serving jail time or forgoing any future
dealings in the securities industry. But few have been held responsible for
an I.O.U. as large as the one a French court pinned on Jérôme Kerviel on
Tuesday: $6.7 billion.
That works out to the amount his rogue trades
ultimately cost Société Générale, The New York Times’s Nicola Clark reports.
But how does it equate to other famous (or infamous) traders gone rogue
through the years?
It depends how you look at it, said William K.
Black, a professor of economics and law at the University of Missouri-Kansas
City, who specializes in financial fraud.
“In terms of dollar losses caused, he’s No. 1,”
Professor Black told DealBook. “In terms of crushing institutions, he’s not
No. 1.”
That’s because Mr. Kerviel did not actually bring
down his firm, which other rogue traders have done. While only four people
in all of France would be rich enough to pay what Mr. Kerviel’s owes in
restitution — according to Forbes magazine’s list of the world’s
billionaires, at least — his bank lives on.
So, too, do several other famous miscreant traders.
¶Indeed, while Mr. Kerviel may have succeeded in
amassing a fraud of historic magnitude, his rogue counterparts have brought
distinction (or shame) upon themselves in other creative ways:.
¶¶ Creating fake identities. John M. Rusnak pleaded
guilty in 2002 to faking trades in order to hide nearly $700 million in
losses through rogue trades of Japanese yen for Allfirst Financial, which
was then a subsidiary of Allied Irish Banks.
¶Mr. Rusnak worked hard to keep his wrongdoing a
secret. At one point, in order to trick auditors, he was said to have posed
as a fictitious trader, David Russell, with whom he supposedly had dealings.
He pulled it off by renting a box at a Mail Boxes Etc. on the Upper West
Side in Manhattan; when bank auditors wanted to verify his trades with the
supposed Mr. Russell, Mr. Rusnak had them write to that mailbox, where he
then replied as if he were the fictitious trader.
¶Allied Irish Banks sold Allfirst Financial to the
M&T Bank Corporation of Buffalo shortly after the scandal came to light. Mr.
Rusnak, for his part, was released from federal prison last year and has
remained out of the headlines since then.
¶¶ Earning clever nicknames.The Sumitomo
Corporation of Japan in 1996 lost $2.6 billion because of a rogue trader,
Yasuo Hamanaka, the chief of the company’s copper trading operations. Before
his rogue trades became public, he had earned the nickname “Mr. 5 Percent” —
referring to the share of the world’s copper market he was said to control.
¶Mr. Hamanaka pleaded guilty to forgery and fraud
and was jailed until 2005. Paying homage to what made him famous, he told
Bloomberg News upon his release that he was “amazed” at how the price of
copper had risen while he was incarcerated.
¶Making the best-seller list. In the mid-1990s,
Daiwa Bank lost more than $1 billion as a result of a rogue New York-based
bond trader, Toshihide Iguchi. Mr. Iguchi was sentenced to four years in
prison, which he told The Wall Street Journal was less painful than the life
of deceit he was living as a rogue trader trying to cover his tracks.
¶While in prison, he wrote a memoir, “The
Confession,” that was widely read in Japan. But after settling in Georgia
upon his release, the only work Mr. Iguchi could find was a $10-an-hour job
at a furniture-building shop, so he eventually headed back to Japan, where
he opened an English school, The Journal reported in 2008.
¶But Mr. Kerviel’s case brought back bad memories.
Mr. Iguchi told The Journal that shortly after the French trader was
accused, he had nightmares about his own rogue trading.
¶Going Hollywood. Nicholas W. Leeson, a trader for
the British investment bank Barings, managed to topple his bank in 1995 as a
result of his rogue trading. Based in Singapore, Mr. Leeson lost more than
$1 billion through ill-fated bets on Japanese stock prices and interest
rates.
¶Mr. Leeson pleaded guilty in Singapore to fraud
and forgery and served four years in prison. He is now the chief executive
of an Irish soccer club, Galway United.
¶But perhaps best of all, Mr. Leeson managed to
carve for himself a place in popular culture. He commanded a reported
$700,000 advance for a ghostwritten memoir, “Rogue Trader” (1997), and more
recently published a self-help book, “Back from the Brink: Coping With
Stress” (2005).
¶His first book was made into a 1999 film starring
Ewan McGregor. The film, like Mr. Leeson’s trading practices, was widely
panned.
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's threads on securities and trader fraud ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudRotten.htm#InvestmentBanking
As seen on Paul Caron's
TaxProf Blog, September 21, 2011 ---
http://taxprof.typepad.com/
Perhaps you have to remember Nixon and Kissinger to appreciate this one.
The New Yorker's Advice for Dating a Tax Lawyer
The New Yorker,
Alarm Bells, by Andy Borowitz:
When I’m on a first date, alarm bells always go off
if the woman says, “Let’s play Nixon.” This happened a few weeks ago when I
was out with a tax attorney from one of the big midtown firms whom I met on
OkCupid. I can understand why she wanted to play, because she was totally
great at it. She looked scary with her shoulders hunched over, growling
about the press and vowing revenge against the people on her enemies list.
But as she started screaming about Jane Fonda and Joe Namath, I thought, Did
it even occur to her that maybe I wanted to be Nixon and she could be
Kissinger? That set off major alarm bells for me, because the last thing I
need in my life is someone who’s inconsiderate.
"U.S. Alleges Poker Site Stacked Deck," by Alexandra Berzon, The
Wall Street Journal, September 21, 2011 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904106704576582741398633386.html?grcc=88888&mod=WSJ_hps_sections_business
As professional poker players, Howard Lederer,
Chris Ferguson and Rafael Furst got rich by bluffing players out of their
money in televised tournaments. Now, the U.S. government alleges that they
and their colleagues used this same approach in running one of the world's
largest online poker sites.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Justice Department in a civil
suit accused Messrs. Lederer, Ferguson and Furst, and another director of
the company behind the Full Tilt Poker website, of defrauding thousands of
online poker players out of more than $300 million that is still owed to
them. The government said that, in total, the 23 owners of the site had
taken out $444 million in distributions over the years.
The Justice Department's civil suit against Full
Tilt alleges that in 2010, Full Tilt began having trouble accepting new bets
from players, thanks to U.S. efforts to crack down on payment-processing
services for online gambling. But the U.S. says that Full Tilt's owners kept
paying themselves millions of dollars anyway, fraudulently depleting the
player funds on deposit with the company.
Enlarge Image FULLTILT_jmp FULLTILT_jmp
"Full Tilt was not a legitimate poker company, but
a global Ponzi scheme," said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in a
statement Tuesday. The U.S. government views online poker operations, at
least those that cross state lines, as illegal.
In its civil suit filed in U.S. District Court in
New York, the government alleged that Messrs. Lederer and Ferguson received
$38 million and $24 million, respectively, in distributions from Full Tilt.
It also alleged that a third poker player involved in the site, Mr. Furst,
received $12 million and Raymond Bitar, who helped manage Full Tilt, got $40
million.
"Mr. Furst hasn't done anything wrong," said David
Angeli, Mr. Furst's attorney. "He always acted in what he believed was the
best interest of players and anyone associated with Full Tilt." Attorneys
for Mr. Ferguson and for Mr. Bitar had no comment. Attempts to reach Mr.
Lederer weren't successful.
In a statement in August, Full Tilt acknowledged
that it was having problems processing player money and said it lost $115
million to government seizure and $42 million it says was stolen by a
third-party payment processor.
"While the company was on the way to addressing the
problems caused by these processors, Full Tilt Poker never anticipated that
the DOJ would proceed as it did by seizing our global domain name and
shutting down the site worldwide," the company said. It said it was seeking
outside investment and was committed to paying players in full.
The accusations against Full Tilt are part of a
crackdown that began in April when the Justice Department indicted
executives at three major online poker companies, including Full Tilt, on
charges of illegal gambling, bank fraud and money laundering. The government
sought $3 billion from the companies, shut down their sites and stopped much
of the online poker played in the U.S. It also filed a civil suit at the
time, which it amended Tuesday to include much more detailed allegations
against Full Tilt.
The Wall Street Journal has examined how the owners
of Full Tilt played a cat-and-mouse game around the globe to process money
from U.S. Internet poker players outside the purview of U.S. authorities.
The government charges have upended an industry
that in the past decade became a behemoth online business as Full Tilt and
other websites fueled a global poker boom. Full Tilt once hosted 54,000
people in a single online tournament.
The crackdown has shaken the large universe of
poker fans. Before the April crackdown, researcher H2 Gambling Capital
estimated there were 1.7 million active poker player accounts in the U.S.
from players wagering around $14 billion a year online.
In London, Sebastian Fox, an aspiring music
producer, said he could earn around $1,200 a month playing poker online. He
racked up $8,000 in an account on Full Tilt. On June 29, he said that he
tried to withdraw around $2,400 to pay for rent and other living expenses
and discovered Full Tilt's website had been closed down, following the U.S.
suit and a subsequent raid by authorities in the U.K.'s Channel Islands
where Full Tilt is licensed to operate its website.
"I didn't even consider such a big company would be
able to go bust just like that," Mr. Fox said.
The U.S. government has long argued that online
gambling, including poker, is illegal under the Wire Act, a 1961 law that
explicitly prohibits sports betting conducted over electronic communication.
The law is less clear about other types of gambling that are outlawed by the
Wire Act, say legal experts.
Online poker sites started popping up over a decade
ago but took off in 2003 when an accountant named Chris Moneymaker entered
an online tournament and later won $2.5 million in the World Series of
Poker. His success enticed thousands of new players online and lured
entrepreneurs hoping to capitalize on the boom.
Among them was a lanky poker player, Chris
Ferguson, nicknamed "Jesus." Mr. Ferguson, who sported a thick, shaggy
haircut and had a Ph.D in software engineering, and his colleague Mr. Bitar
tinkered with their concept for web poker while they traded stocks in Los
Angeles. The idea: recruit stars from the poker world to lure players to a
new site.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
It's hard for me to feel sorry for people that are ignorant enough to play
online poker. That's just asking to be ripped off!
Bob Jensen's Fraud Updates are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
"Gazing Into Higher Ed's Future," by Doug Lederman, Inside Higher
Ed, September 22, 2011 ---
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/09/22/u_s_report_projects_sharp_rise_in_college_degrees_widening_of_gender_gap
. . .
Postsecondary enrollments will increase
nonetheless, the department projects, rising 17 percent, to 22.4 million
students, from 2008 through 2019. The flattening in the number of high
school graduates will be more than offset, the analysis speculates, by sharp
jumps in the number of 25- to 29-year-olds. While that age cohort made up
14.3 percent of all enrollments in 2008, 25- to 29-year-olds will make up
15.3 percent of all students by 2019, the department projects. The overall
enrollment increase, while sizable, would actually represent a slowing pace,
as total enrollments grew by 34 percent in the period from 1994 to 2008, the
analysis shows.
The age of who enrolls would not be the only factor
to change meaningfully under the federal projection. While the numbers of
full-time and part-time students would increase at the same rate (17
percent) between 2008 and 2019, the analysis finds, the rate of increase for
Hispanic and Latino enrollments (45 percent) would greatly outpace those of
other racial groups -- 30 percent for black and Asian/Pacific Islander
students, 7 percent for white students, and 5 percent for American Indian or
Alaska Native students.
And the gender gap, already a concern for many in
higher education, would widen: with enrollments of women growing by 21
percent and men by just 12 percent, as the department projects, by 2019
women would make up 59 percent of all postsecondary students, up from the
current 57.1 percent.
(One piece of potentially interesting information
that cannot be gleaned from the current report is whether the government
expects the recent growth of for-profit colleges to continue. The report
lumps for-profit and private nonprofit colleges together in a "private"
category, and projects that those institutions will see a slight decline
between 2008 and 2019 [to 26.4 from 26.9] in the percentage of all students
they enroll. William Hussar, an economist at the statistics center, said via
e-mail that its officials did not believe that their statistical models were
"adequately capturing the historic trends of the data" on for-profit
enrollments, so "we decided not to include these projections.")
Continued in article
THE COLLEGE OF 2020: STUDENTS ---
https://www.chronicle-store.com/Store/ProductDetails.aspx?CO=CQ&ID=76319&PK=N5S11XX
Higher Education
Controversies ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm
A Hero Named Daisy
Forwarded by Auntie Bev
James Crane worked on the 101st floor of Tower 1 of the World Trade
Center . He is blind so he has a golden retriever named Daisy. After the
plane hit 20 stories below, James knew that he was doomed, so he let Daisy
go, out of an act of love. She darted away into the darkened hallway.
Choking on the fumes of the jet fuel and the smoke James was just waiting to
die. About 30 minutes later, Daisy comes back along with James' boss, who
Daisy just happened to pick up on floor 112.
On her first run of the building, she leads James, James' boss, and about
300 more people out of the doomed building. But she wasn't through yet, she
knew there were others who were trapped. So, highly against James' wishes
she ran back in the building.
On her second run, she saved 392 lives. Again she went back in. During
this run, the building collapses. James hears about this and falls on his
knees into tears. Against all known odds, Daisy makes it out alive, but this
time she is carried by a firefighter. "She led us right to the people,
before she got injured" the fireman explained.
Her final run saved another 273 lives. She suffered acute smoke
inhalation, severe burns on all four paws, and a broken leg, but she saved
967 lives. Daisy is the first civilian Canine to win the Medal of Honor of
New York City.
September 11, 2011 message from John Ensminger
Bob—I noticed
you’ve been blogging about the WikiLeaks documents. I recently did a
number of searches for “canine,” “police dog,” and “dog” on a beta
search site and found about 70 documents. I summarized 51 of them in a
blog.
http://doglawreporter.blogspot.com/2011/09/wikidogs-canines-in-leaked-us.html
Most of them involve
embassies notifying Washington headquarters about the successes of bomb
and drug detection dogs used by other countries but funded, one way or
another, by the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and
Law Enforcement Affairs (“INL” in the cables). I’ll keep digging and
update the blog as I find more. Thanks for keeping me on your email
list. You find real gems. –
John
Jensen Comment
Books by John Ensminger ---
http://www.amazon.com/John-J.-Ensminger/e/B0033FKZMW
September 13, 2011 Message from Eileen Taylor
Note for those who use Moodle and think their
hidden pdfs are truly hidden.
Students may gain access to hidden pdfs on Moodle, even before they are
unhidden.
Here is how:
A student opened up a Chapter 2 pdf solution that had been unhidden. From
there, he went to the address line in the browser and simply changed
the "2" to a "3" to see the Chapter 3 solution. Since all the files are
named in a similar fashion, he figured out the pattern and was able to
access all the chapter solutions. This applies to pdfs that do not have
random file names. Word docs may not be as vulnerable, and random files
names would also solve the problem.
Proud student felt the need to Tweet about his discovery to the world.
I would award the student:
Plus 10 for creativity/innovation
Minus 30 for Tweeting about it
and for us:
Minus 100 for not teaching students how to recognize and respond to an
ethical issue...
Eileen
"Iran arrests 19 people in $2.6 billion bank fraud described as nation’s
biggest financial scam," The Washington Post, September 19, 2011 ---
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/iran-arrests-19-people-in-26-billion-bank-fraud-described-as-nations-biggest-financial-scam/2011/09/19/gIQANmXNeK_story.html
Iran’s state prosecutor says authorities have
arrested 19 suspects in a $2.6 billion bank fraud described as the biggest
financial corruption scam in Iran’s history.
Several newspapers, including the pro-reform Shargh
daily, quote Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejehei as saying more people will be
arrested.
Parliament summoned the finance minister and the
central bank governor to discuss the case on Monday.
Officials say the fraud involved the use of forged
documents to get credit at one of Iran’s top financial institutions to
purchase assets including major state-owned companies.
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's fraud updates are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
"Online Search Ads Hijack Prospective Students, Former Employee Says,"
by Josh Keller, Chronicle of Higher Education, September 7, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/online-search-ads-hijack-prospective-students-former-employee-says/33047?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Last year, James Soloway called hundreds of
prospective students per day on behalf of a company that placed
advertisements on Google and Bing. The ads promised to help students contact
the admissions offices of public colleges if they filled out an online form
and included their phone number.
He told the students who responded that they would
hear from their preferred public college, even though they almost never did.
In the meantime, he said, they should consider attending a for-profit
college—such as Kaplan University, Grand Canyon University, or the
University of Phoenix.
Most of the prospective students were confused.
Some hung up. But sometimes, the pitch worked, he says. Some people,
especially high-school students, believed he was an educational counselor
and gave weight to his recommendations, he says.
The entire process was designed to redirect
students who wanted information on a public college to a for-profit college,
Mr. Soloway says. “The expectation was that we were not to allow a call to
end with a student until we had created three private-school leads.”
The account offers new details about the practices
of lead-generation companies that place misleading search ads to lure
prospective students. (Click
here to download Mr. Soloway’s full description of
the call center’s activities.) In July,
The Chronicle found dozens of ads on
Google and Bing that falsely implied relationships with public colleges in
order to get students to give away information that can be sold to
for-profits.
Mr. Soloway made calls on behalf of one of those
lead-generation companies,
Vantage Media, from March to December 2010. The
company contracted with a call center run by Mr. Soloway’s employer,
Inspyre Solutions.
Representatives of Vantage, Kaplan, and Westwood
College did not respond to requests for comment. Vantage officials have
previously said that they provide a free service to both colleges and
students, and that the company does not mislead anybody.
Mr. Soloway said he is speaking publicly about his
former work because he feels bad that he helped to deceive students. He
estimates that Vantage’s online marketing efforts brought in at least 2,000
prospects per week to the Winnipeg, Manitoba, call center where he worked.
After learning that students never heard back from
the public colleges they were trying to reach—and realizing that he might
soon be fired for poor performance—he quit his job and filed a complaint
with the Federal Trade Commission in February about Vantage’s practices.
“I feel bad that I was part of something that took
advantage of people, a lot of them kids still in high school,” he says.
Mr. Soloway said he was given a single day of
training before starting to work on behalf of Vantage, which made it
difficult to advise students on their educational options. For instance, he
says he started without knowing the differences between various nursing
degrees.
Continued in article
"Colleges Fight Google Ads That Reroute Prospective Students," by Josh
Keller, Chronicle of Higher Education, July 31, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Colleges-Fight-Google-Ads-That/128414/?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
Misleading Promotional Sites for For-Profit Universities
For-profit universities provide some free Website services in an effort
to lure people into signing up for for-profit programs without ever
mentioning that in most instances the students would be better off in more
prestigious non-profit universities such as state-supported universities
with great online programs and extension services.
I'm bombarded with messages like the following one from ---
http://www.paralegal.net/
Then go to the orange box at
http://www.paralegal.net/more/
If you feed in the data that you're interested in a bachelor's degree in
business with an accounting concentration, the only choices given are
for-profit universities. No mention is made of better programs at the
Universities of Wisconsin, Maryland, Connecticut, Massachusetts, etc.
I've stopped linking to the many for-profit university sites like this.
My threads on distance education alternatives are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm
Bob Jensen's threads on for-profit universities operating in the gray zone
of fraud ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#ForProfitFraud
"Ambitious Provider of Online Courses Loses Fans Among Colleges," by
Sara Lipka, Chronicle of Higher Education, September 18, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Ambitious-Provider-of-Online/129052/
To students, starting college for $99 a month
sounds like a deal. To wonks wrapped up in soaring tuition and declining
financial aid, it may sound like a solution.
That's how a company called StraighterLine, which
offers online, self-paced introductory courses, became a darling of the
industry—at least in theory. Carol A. Twigg, president of the National
Center for Academic Transformation and a member of StraighterLine's advisory
board, has lauded the idea; Kevin Carey, policy director at Education
Sector, has hailed the company's founder, Burck Smith, as a potential
revolutionary.
But a revolution is hard to pull off. If
StraighterLine is going to transform higher education, it needs mainstream
colleges to take it seriously—and that means counting its courses for
credit. In the past month, it has suffered on that front. Four of the
more-established institutions that had agreed to grant credit have cut ties
with StraighterLine. If colleges won't cooperate, Mr. Smith has a plan; he's
already talking to state lawmakers, who can make them.
. . .
21 Colleges Remain Partners With
StraighterLine
As of August, the following colleges had agreed to
accept StraighterLine’s online, self-paced courses for credit. Since then,
the four institutions in bold have cut their ties with the company.
American College of Dubai
American InterContinental University
Ashford University
Assumption College
Capella University
Charter Oak State College
Colorado State University Global Campus
DeVry University
Excelsior College
Florida Gateway College
Fort Hays State University
Granite State College
Jefferson Community and Technical College
Kaplan University
La Salle University
Nazarene Bible College
New England College of Business
Potomac College
Thomas Edison State College
Thompson Rivers University
University of Akron
Western Governors University
Western Governors University-Indiana
Western Governors University-Texas
Western Governors University-Washington
Bob Jensen's threads on for-profit university controversies ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#ForProfitFraud
"As "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Ends, ROTC Returns to Harvard," Inside
Higher Ed, September 21, 2011 ---
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/09/21/qt#270888
Harvard University welcomed the Navy's Reserve
Officers Training Corps program back to its campus after 40 years on
Tuesday, as the Obama administration formally ended the military's "don't
ask, don't tell" policy regarding gay service members in the military,
The Boston Globe
reported.
Bob Jensen's threads on higher education controversies ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm
Professors have become a major part of the problem of declining
expectations for student performance
"Lower Education," by Michael Morris, Inside Higher Ed,
September 9, 2011 ---
Click Here
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2011/09/09/morris_essay_on_faculty_responsibility_for_decline_in_college_student_standards
Toby (not his real name) flunked a graduate course
I taught last year. He failed the in-class assignment (a mid-term essay
exam) as well as the out-of-class assignments (a couple of case analyses and
a take-home exam). Reviewing Toby’s work was excruciating; extracting
coherence from his paragraphs was a futile exercise, even with repeated
readings. Theoretical analysis in his writing was virtually nonexistent. Put
simply, this was an academic train wreck.
As I interacted with Toby over the course of the
term, I kept asking myself, “How did this pleasant young man ever manage to
obtain an undergraduate degree?” He certainly had one, awarded by a
regionally accredited institution (not mine). And how did he get into yet
another institution (my institution, but not my program) to pursue a
master’s degree?
Welcome to the world of Lower Education. Toby’s
case may be extreme, but it underscores a fundamental reality that shapes a
major segment of higher education in the United States: Colleges cannot
survive without students, so colleges that have a difficult time competing
for the “best” students compete for the “next best” ones. And colleges that
have trouble securing the “next best” students focus on the “next-next
best” ones, and on and on and on, until a point is reached where the word
“best” is no longer relevant. When this occurs, students who are not
prepared to be in college, and certainly not prepared to be in graduate
school, end up in our classrooms.
This is not startling news. It’s a rare college or
university that does not have an academic remediation/triage center of some
kind on campus, where an enormous amount of time is spent teaching students
skills they should have learned in high school. To be sure, many of these
unprepared students drop out of college before graduation, but a significant
percentage do make it to the finish line. Some of the latter will have
indeed earned their degree through great effort and what they’ve learned
from us. But others will have muddled through without displaying the skills
we should require of all students. My 35 years of university experience tell
me that in these cases faculty collusion is often a contributing factor.
What is the nature of this collusion? In far too
many instances, little is required of students in terms of the quality and
quantity of their academic work, little is produced, and the little produced
is, to put it mildly, graded generously. Some might argue that the
mind-numbing proportions of A’s we often see these days, along with the
relative scarcity of low grades, is a reflection of more effective teaching
strategies being employed by professors, coupled with a growing population
of bright students committed to academic excellence. Unfortunately, this
uplifting scenario strikes me as much less persuasive than one that
implicates factors such as transactional/contract grading (“5 article
reviews equal an A, 4 equals a B,” etc.), faculty who wish to avoid arguing
with increasingly aggressive students about grades, faculty who believe that
awarding high grades generates positive student evaluations, faculty who
express their philosophical opposition to grading by giving high grades, and
the growing percentage of courses taught by part-time and non-tenure-track
faculty members who might see the assigning of a conspicuous number of low
grades as a threat to their being re-hired.
One of the most pernicious consequences of this
state of affairs is cynicism toward higher education among those most
directly responsible for delivering higher education -- the faculty.
Research suggests that one of the most powerful sources of motivation for
outstanding employee performance is goal/value internalization. This occurs
when espoused organizational goals and values are “owned” by organizational
members, who then strive to achieve the goals and live up to the values in
their work. Colleges and universities have traditionally been in a
privileged position with respect to drawing upon this type of motivation,
given their educational mission. The beliefs associated with this mission
can include a sizable chunk of myth, but as societal myths go, the ones
embraced by higher education (e.g., the ability of research, knowledge, and
analytical skill to enhance the public good) tend to have high social value.
In the current zeitgeist, however, many faculty are
dismayed to see the provision of educational credentials trumping the
actual provision of education. (Fifty might not be the new forty, but
the master’s degree is certainly the new bachelor’s.) This perception is
enhanced by a proliferation of curriculum-delivery formats (weekend courses,
accelerated and online programs, etc.) whose pedagogical soundness often
receives much less attention than the ability of the formats to penetrate
untapped educational markets. It is difficult for a strong commitment to
academic integrity to thrive in such environments.
Faculty who are distressed over all of this should
not wait for presidents, provosts and deans to rescue higher education from
itself. Moreover, regional accrediting bodies, despite their growing
emphasis on outcomes assessment, do not typically focus on courses, programs
and admissions standards in a way that allows them to adequately address
these issues. For the most part it is faculty who teach the classes,
design and implement curricula, and, at least at the graduate level,
establish admissions policies for programs. What should faculty do? I offer
three modest suggestions:
- At the departmental level, work to develop a
culture where expectations for student performance are high. When
faculty members believe that teaching challenging courses is “the way we
do things here,” they are less likely to offer non-challenging ones.
- Advocate throughout the institution for the
centrality of academic quality to policy making, program development,
and program implementation. The question “What are we doing to ensure
that X embodies a commitment to academic excellence?”
should never be left implicit.
- Create opportunities for faculty and
administrators to come together in small groups to explore the issues
raised by Lower Education. These two constituencies need to find a way
to collaborate more effectively, and the mutual stereotyping that
frequently characterizes their relationship represents a major obstacle.
If we want our conversations relevant to Lower Education to change,
let’s experiment with changing the structure within which some of those
conversations take place.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
In addition to lowered admission standards, an even bigger problem is the grip
students have over teachers due to fears teachers have of poor student
evaluations, including those acerbic evaluations on RateMyProfessor that are
available for the entire world to view ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#GradeInflation
Video
"Debt: The First 5,000 Years," by Paul Kedrosky , Kedrosky.com, September
10, 2011 ---
Click Here
http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2011/09/debt-the-first-5000-years.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+InfectiousGreed+%28Paul+Kedrosky%27s+Infectious+Greed%29
Jensen Questions
How did the accounting system account for debt 5,000 years ago?
Does care and nurturing human children create debt to parents?
Bob Jensen's threads on accounting history ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Theory01.htm#AccountingHistory
Affirmative Action in the "Extreme"
"U. of Wisconsin Is Accused of Bias Against White Applicants,"
Chronicle of Higher Education, September 13, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/u-of-wisconsin-is-accused-of-bias-against-white-applicants/36170
Jensen Comment
The University of Wisconsin fought tooth and nail to keep the data hidden from
the public and investigators.
Affirmative action has been much easier and legally defensible in Texas under
the controversial 10% rule that basically ignores the comparative academic
qualifications of the top 10% of each in-state high school graduating class such
that a student with a low admission score competes equally with merit scholar if
they are both in the top 10% of their graduating classes. If both choose a
flagship university both are assured of admission. The net result at the
flagship universities in Texas is to exclude admission to many higher scoring
white students who did not make the top 10% of their relatively affluent school
districts.
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#AcademicStandards
This is a boon to private universities in Texas that get some top SAT and ACT
students who would've otherwise have preferred to go to the University of Texas
or Texas A&M but were denied admission because of the 10% rule. The 10% rule in
Texas is not a magic affirmative action bullet for 90% of the students who did
not graduate in the top 10%.
Officials at the flagship schools in Texas complain that the 10% rule takes
admission decisions out of the hands of the flagship universities --- at least
to a degree that the universities feel is has negative implications. For
example, if the 10% rule fills most admission capacity, this greatly limits
admissions of highly qualified out-of-state students and international students.
It can also lead to program imbalances where students who prefer to major in
Classical Studies might be denied admission in favor of minorities who clog the
business schools. It could also harm athletics, although I suspect Texas and
Texas A&M have figured out ways to get around this problem for varsity
athletics. There may not be enough 350 lb football players or basketball players
over seven feet in height in the top 10% of high school graduating classes in
Texas.
Not having a 10% rule in Wisconsin means that admission officers had to make
more deliberate white student denial decisions when minority students with lower
academic qualifications are accepted over white applicants having equal or
higher qualifications. The was temporarily decreed illegal in Michigan, but an
appeals court recently overturned the law such that the Michigan Supreme Court
will now take up the issue of whether this Wisconsin-style affirmative action is
to be permanently banned in Michigan. My guess is that the U.S. Supreme Court
will ultimately make a decisive affirmative action decision in this regard, but
the legal fighting in states may carry on for years before the Supremes take up
a decisive case.
It would seem that the legal and political battle in Wisconsin is about
to commence.
"Too Much Higher Education," by Walter E. Williams, Townhall,
September 14, 2011 ---
http://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2011/09/14/too_much_higher_education
Too much of anything is just as much a
misallocation of resources as it is too little, and that applies to higher
education just as it applies to everything else. A recent study from The
Center for College Affordability and Productivity titled "From Wall Street
to Wal-Mart," by Richard Vedder, Christopher Denhart, Matthew Denhart,
Christopher Matgouranis and Jonathan Robe, explains that college education
for many is a waste of time and money. More than one-third of currently
working college graduates are in jobs that do not require a degree. An essay
by Vedder that complements the CCAP study reports that there are "one-third
of a million waiters and waitresses with college degrees." The study says
Vedder -- distinguished professor of economics at Ohio University, an
adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and director of CCAP --
"was startled a year ago when the person he hired to cut down a tree had a
master's degree in history, the fellow who fixed his furnace was a
mathematics graduate, and, more recently, a TSA airport inspector (whose job
it was to ensure that we took our shoes off while going through security)
was a recent college graduate."
The nation's college problem is far deeper than the
fact that people simply are overqualified for particular jobs. Citing the
research of AEI scholar Charles Murray's book "Real Education" (2008),
Vedder says: "The number going to college exceeds the number capable of
mastering higher levels of intellectual inquiry. This leads colleges to
alter their mission, watering down the intellectual content of what they
do." In other words, colleges dumb down courses so that the students they
admit can pass them. Murray argues that only a modest proportion of our
population has the cognitive skills, work discipline, drive, maturity and
integrity to master truly higher education. He says that educated people
should be able to read and understand classic works, such as John Locke's
"Essay Concerning Human Understanding" or William Shakespeare's "King Lear."
These works are "insightful in many ways," he says, but a person of average
intelligence "typically lacks both the motivation and ability to do so."
Mastering complex forms of mathematics is challenging but necessary to
develop rigorous thinking and is critical in some areas of science and
engineering.
Continued in article
The Case Against College ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#CaseAgainst
"Mystery Diagnosis: An Era of Uncertainty for the Health Care Sector,"
Knowledge@Wharton, September 14, 2011 ---
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2847
The U.S. health care sector is experiencing a
time of enormous change and uncertainty. Although President Obama's health
care reform plan was signed into law last year, several legal challenges to
the legislation are working their way through the courts. Questions also
remain about whether the law will deliver on its promises of greater access
to care and stricter containment of soaring health care costs.
Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry is also
dealing with a period of insecurity, with generic markets soon opening up
for some of the world's best-selling drugs. And although the health care
sector is one of the few employment bright spots in a stagnant job market,
questions arise as to whether it is in danger of becoming too bloated.
Wharton health care management professors
Arnold Rosoff,
Patricia Danzon,
Lawton Burns and
Mark Pauly discussed
their research on these issues and others during a recent presentation to
incoming health care MBA students.
Politics over Policy?
After decades of debate over national health care
reform, Wharton legal studies and health care management professor Arnold
Rosoff warned that struggles over the Affordable Care Act (ACA), signed into
law by President Obama in March 2010, may be far from over. It is uncertain
whether the reform legislation, which was passed in a greatly compromised
form after years of "partisan wrangling," can deliver on its promises of
cost containment and expanded access to health care for the uninsured,
Rosoff noted. "But before we get to that, we have to ask, 'Will ACA even
stay on the books?'"
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's threads on health care ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm
From the Scout Report on September 9, 2011
Prey (for locating missing phones and
computers) ---
http://preyproject.com/
The Prey application is quite invaluable and it is a fine way to locate a
missing phone or computer. After downloading Prey, users can gather
information regarding the device's location, hardware, and network status.
Also, users can grab a screenshot of what the device is doing at that moment
and they can also even take a picture of the potential thief with the
device's webcam. This particular version is compatible with those computers
running Mac OS X 10.4 and newer, Windows 2000 and newer, and Linux.
Mixtab 1.3 ---
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mixtab/id438373717?mt=12
Would you like to keep tabs (literally) on some of
your favorite topics and interests? With this highly visual RSS feed
aggregator, it is quite easy to do. Mixtab allows visitors to pick from
thousands of pre-existing topics and they can use the visual interface to
reorder these topics as they see fit. The site for Mixtab has a FAQ area,
along with a primer on how to use the application most effectively.
Out in the Pinwheel Galaxy, a rare event takes place Astronomers forgo
sleep; eyes fixed on star's explosion
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/story/2011-09-07/Astronomers-forgo-sleep-eyes-fixed-on-stars-explosion/50303380/1#.TmjMWp9vWhA
How to See a Supernova From Your Backyard this Weekend
http://www.universetoday.com/88617/how-to-see-a-supernova-from-your-backyard-this-weekend/
A Stellar Explosion In The Big Dipper
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/03/140163733/a-stellar-explosion-in-the-big-dippers-handle
The Hubble Space Telescope
http://hubble.nasa.gov/
The Pinwheel Galaxy
http://www.ing.iac.es/PR/press/m101.html
White Dwarfs
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/science/know_l2/dwarfs.html
From the Scout Report on September 16, 2011
Retickr ---
http://retickr.com
The folks at Retickr study the interaction between
humans and their computers, and one of their goals is to make these
interactions more efficient and productive. The Retickr application allows
users to create a customizable streaming feed that can be filled with
information customized by creating playlists or source lists. There could be
a "work" playlist, populated by sites like CNN or the Wall Street Journal.
Then users could also create a "home" playlist, populated by entertainment
sites. Retickr is integrated with social media, so visitors can stream
updates from Facebook, Twitter, and other networking sites. This version is
compatible with computers running Windows XP and newer or Mac OS X 10.3 and
newer.
PeerBlock 1.1 ---
http://www.peerblock.com
The PeerBlock application allows users to control
who their computer communicates with while connected to the Internet. After
a quick installation, users can establish lists of computers they wish to
block, and essentially, it blocks unwanted IP addresses. Visitors will note
that there is an FAQ area on this site, along with a selection of
screenshots. This version is compatible with computers running Windows 2000
and newer.
Glow in the dark cats may lead to important advances in finding a cure
for HIV
Cats That Glow For AIDS Research Join List of Animals That Shine
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/09/14/140465088/cats-that-glow-for-aids-research-join-list-of-animals-that-shine
'Green-Glowing' Cats May Help to Fight Against HIV/AIDS
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/213108/20110913/glowing-cats-mayo-clinic-japan-hiv-aids.htm
The Scientist: Fluorescent Cats Aid Research
http://the-scientist.com/2011/09/13/fluorescent-cats-aid-research/
Glowing Animals: Pictures of Beasts Shining For Science
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/photogalleries/glowing-animal-pictures
International Society for Transgenic Technologies
http://www.transtechsociety.org/
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2008
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2008/
From the Scout Report on September 23, 2011
MapQuest 4 Mobile 2.5.2 ---
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mapquest-4-mobile/id316126557?mt=8
If you find yourself getting lost on a regular
basis or just in need of directions, you may want to download this version
of MapQuest 4 Mobile. With this application, users will get voice-guided,
turn-by-turn navigational directions to their destination. Users can also
check on the current traffic conditions, and MapQuest 4 Mobile also works to
modify directions as needed based on such conditions. This version is
compatible with iPhone and iPad devices running iOS 3.1.3 and newer and
BlackBerry devices (via BlackBerry App World).
LibreOffice 3.3.4 ---
http://www.libreoffice.org/
Designed to function as an open source productivity
suite, LibreOffice contains a word processing application, a detailed
calculator, and the rather powerful "Impress" tool. The "Impress" tool
allows users to enhance presentations by adding 2D and 3D clip art, special
effects, and transition styles. This version is compatible with computers
running Windows 2000 and newer, Mac OS X 10.3 and newer, and Linux
As dams are removed on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, many
arehopeful for the future
Special Reports: Elwha River Valley
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/flatpages/specialreports/elwha/index.html
Elwha ceremony recalls how treaty fight changed Northwest
http://voices.idahostatesman.com/2011/09/19/rockybarker/franks_impromptu_comments_elwha_recognize_treaty_fights
Wild-fish groups to sue over Elwha River hatchery
http://www.chron.com/news/article/Wild-fish-groups-to-sue-over-Elwha-River-
hatchery-2177879.php
Farewell, Dams. Hello, Salmon?
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/farewell-dams-hello-salmon/
Olympic National Park: Elwha River Restoration
http://www.nps.gov/olym/naturescience/elwha-ecosystem-restoration.htm
Man to Machine: Peninsula Logging
http://content.lib.washington.edu/cmpweb/exhibits/logging/index.html
Free online textbooks, cases, and tutorials in accounting, finance,
economics, and statistics ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks
Education Tutorials
The Digital Revolution and Higher Education ---
http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/College-presidents.aspx
Back to School: Free Resources for Lifelong Learners Everywhere ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/back_to_school_free_resources_for_lifelong_learners_everywhere.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Skylight: eTLC Resource Project [Teaching Improvement] ---
http://www.skylight.science.ubc.ca/aboutetlc
From Stanford University
Humanities Research Network (including music and composition)---
https://www.humanitiesnetwork.org/
Educational Comics Collection ---
http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/edcomics
WhyCTE: Career Technical Education ---
http://whycte.org/
Smart About Money - National Endowment for Financial Education ---
http://www.smartaboutmoney.org/
Free Video Lecture: Globalization of Capital Flows
Taught by Professor Timothy Taylor, Macalester College M.Econ., Stanford
University
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/special/CapitalFlowsFreeLecture.aspx
Optimizing Brain Fitness: Free Video Lecture on How Your Brain Works
Taught by Dr. Richard Restak, The George Washington University School of
Medicine and Health Sciences
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/special/optimizing-brain-fitness.aspx
The Great Courses ---
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/greatcourses.aspx
Most of these are not free courses, but this company makes money because of
lecture quality
National Association for Gifted Children - STEM ---
http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=1484
Education, Demand, and Unemployment in Metropolitan America ---
http://www.brookings.edu/papers/2011/0909_skills_unemployment_rothwell_berube.aspx
Bob Jensen's threads on free lectures and videos and course materials from
prestigious universities
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI
Bob Jensen's threads on general education tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#EducationResearch
Engineering, Science, and Medicine Tutorials
Richard Dawkins Introduces His New Illustrated Book, The Magic of Reality ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/richard_dawkins_introduces_his_new_illustrated_book_ithe_magic_of_realityi.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
A Moment of Science (explanations of phenomena) ---
http://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/
The Aurora Borealis Viewed from Orbit (and What Creates Those Northern
Lights?) ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/aurora_borealis_from_orbit.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Physics to go videos ---
http://www.physics.org/article-interact.asp?id=59
125 Great Science Videos: From Astronomy to Physics & Psychology ---
http://www.openculture.com/science_videos
NOVA: Evolution [Flash Player] ---
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/
Darwin's
original theory of evolution goes online ---
http://www.darwin-online.org.uk/
The Largest Black Holes in the Universe: A Visual Introduction ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/the_largest_black_holes_in_the_universe.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Inner Body (Anatomy and Physiology) ---
http://www.innerbody.com/
Wings and Seeds - The Zaagkii Project (botany, etymology) ---
http://wingsandseeds.org/
Open Spaces (Wildlife Refuges) ---
http://www.fws.gov/news/blog/index.cfm
Molecular Logic: Browsing Stepping Stones ---
http://molo.concord.org/database/browse/stepping-stones/
STEMResources.com ---
http://www.stemresources.com/
AccessSTEM ---
http://www.washington.edu/doit/Stem/
National Institutes of Health: Science Education: Research & Training ---
http://www.nih.gov/science/education.htm
CENSHARE - Center to Study Human Animal Relationships and Environments ---
http://censhare.umn.edu/
Chemical Engineering: Process Dynamics and Controls ---
https://open.umich.edu/education/engin/che/che466/fall2008
WhyCTE: Career Technical Education ---
http://whycte.org/
National Institute of General Medical Sciences ---
http://www.nigms.nih.gov/Education/
The Willard Suitcase Exhibit Online (psychiatric, psychiatry, mental illness)
---
http://www.suitcaseexhibit.org/indexhasflash.html
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Collection:
Georgia State University Library [pdf]
http://www.library.gsu.edu/spcoll/pages/area.asp?ldID=105&guideID=515
Open Textbooks: Computer Science ---
http://www.collegeopentextbooks.org/opentextbookcontent/open-textbooks-by-subject/computerscience.html
National Science Foundation: Disasters [Flash Player] ---
http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/disasters/index.jsp
HRSA’s Health Professions ---
http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/index.html
Design Challenge Projects (Engineering) ---
http://www-mdp.eng.cam.ac.uk/nagty/projects.html
Bob Jensen's threads on free online science,
engineering, and medicine tutorials are at ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Science
Social Science and Economics Tutorials
Smart About Money - National Endowment for Financial Education ---
http://www.smartaboutmoney.org/
CENSHARE - Center to Study Human Animal Relationships and Environments ---
http://censhare.umn.edu/
Sophia Smith Collection: Voices of Feminism ---
http://www.smith.edu/library/libs/ssc/vof/vof-intro.html
Video
"Debt: The First 5,000 Years," by Paul Kedrosky , Kedrosky.com, September
10, 2011 ---
Click Here
http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2011/09/debt-the-first-5000-years.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+InfectiousGreed+%28Paul+Kedrosky%27s+Infectious+Greed%29
"Psychology’s Treacherous Trio: Confirmation Bias, Cognitive Dissonance,
and Motivated Reasoning," by sammcnerney, Why We Reason, September 7,
2011 ---
Click Here
http://whywereason.wordpress.com/2011/09/07/psychologys-treacherous-trio-confirmation-bias-cognitive-dissonance-and-motivated-reasoning/
The Willard Suitcase Exhibit Online (psychiatric, psychiatry, mental illness)
---
http://www.suitcaseexhibit.org/indexhasflash.html
National Science Foundation: Disasters [Flash Player] ---
http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/disasters/index.jsp
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: Office of Refugee Resettlement
[pdf] http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Collection:
Georgia State University Library [pdf]
http://www.library.gsu.edu/spcoll/pages/area.asp?ldID=105&guideID=515
Open Spaces (Wildlife Refuges) ---
http://www.fws.gov/news/blog/index.cfm
Atlas of Rural and Small-Town America ---
http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/ruralatlas/
International Road Federation: Publications ---
http://www.irfnet.org/publication.php?id=7&title=IRF Bulletin
HRSA’s Health Professions ---
http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/index.html
EthnicNEWz (New England Focus) ---
http://www.ethnicnewz.org/en/home
Bob Jensen's threads on Economics, Anthropology, Social Sciences, and
Philosophy tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Social
Law and Legal Studies
Sophia Smith Collection: Voices of Feminism ---
http://www.smith.edu/library/libs/ssc/vof/vof-intro.html
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: Office of Refugee Resettlement
[pdf]
http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/
SSRN has updated its monthly rankings of
750 American and international law school faculties and
3,000 law professors by (among other things) the number of paper downloads
from the SSRN database. Here is the new list (through September 9, 2011) of the
Top 25 U.S. Tax Professors in two of the SSRN categories:
all-time downloads and
recent downloads (within the past 12 months):
Thank you Paul Caron for the heads up.
Bob Jensen's threads on law and legal studies are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Law
Math Tutorials
Dangerous Knowledge: 4 Brilliant Mathematicians & Their Drift to Insanity
---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/dangerous_knowledge_4_brilliant_mathematicians_their_drift_to_insanity.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
John Nash is one of the most famous schizophrenic mathematicians---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Nash_%28mathematician%29
Bob Jensen's threads on free online mathematics tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#050421Mathematics
History Tutorials
From Stanford University
Humanities Research Network ---
https://www.humanitiesnetwork.org/
The National Gallery: Virtual Tour ---
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/visiting/virtualtour/
Belligerent Encounters: Graphic Chronicles of War and Revolution, 1500- 1945
http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/exhibitions/B-Encounters/index
The Cave of Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc (archaeology) ---
http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/arcnat/chauvet/en/index.html
Educational Comics Collection ---
http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/edcomics
Sophia Smith Collection: Voices of Feminism ---
http://www.smith.edu/library/libs/ssc/vof/vof-intro.html
Neue Gallerie: Online Collection (Germany, Austria) ---
http://www.neuegalerie.org/collection
University of Illinois at Navy Pier Photographs (1945-1948) ---
Click Here
http://photo.lib.uic.edu/cgi-bin/store/imageFolio.cgi?direct=University_Library_Collections/Historic_UIC_photos/Navy_Pier_Campus&img=
Images from University of Illinois at Chicago Library Collections (photograph
archive) ---
http://library.uic.edu/home/collections/images/images-from-uic-library-collections
Images from University of Illinois at Chicago Library Collections (photograph
archive) ---
http://library.uic.edu/home/collections/images/images-from-uic-library-collections
The Willard Suitcase Exhibit Online (psychiatric, psychiatry, mental illness)
---
http://www.suitcaseexhibit.org/indexhasflash.html
Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets, Caskets, and Cases (art history,
sculpture) --- http://goo.gl/hkMmX
A Treasury of World's Fair Art & Architecture ---
http://digital.lib.umd.edu/worldsfairs/?pid=umd:2
The Making of a Nazi: Disney’s 1943 Animated Short ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/the_making_of_a_nazi_disney.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
The 9/11 Memorial ---
Click Here
Open Spaces (Wildlife Refuges) ---
http://www.fws.gov/news/blog/index.cfm
Video
"Debt: The First 5,000 Years," by Paul Kedrosky , Kedrosky.com, September 10,
2011 ---
Click Here
http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2011/09/debt-the-first-5000-years.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+InfectiousGreed+%28Paul+Kedrosky%27s+Infectious+Greed%29
Boston Private Industry Council ---
http://www.bostonpic.org/
The New Jersey Historical Society ---
http://www.jerseyhistory.org/
Canada's History-Magazine ---
http://www.canadashistory.ca/Magazine.aspx
Bob Jensen's threads on history tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#History
Also see
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm
Language Tutorials
Historic Houston Photographs ---
http://digital.lib.uh.edu/cdm4/about_collection.php?CISOROOT=/p15195coll2
Back to School: Free Resources for Lifelong Learners Everywhere ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/back_to_school_free_resources_for_lifelong_learners_everywhere.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
Bob Jensen's links to language tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Languages
Music Tutorials
A virtual choir 2,000 voices strong (must watch
to the end) ---
http://www.wimp.com/choirvoices/
You can also
Google Eric Whitacre if you would like to view the entire musical piece.
Iowa Digital Library: Stradivari String Quartet Recordings
http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/strad
Bob Jensen's threads on free music tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#050421Music
From Stanford University
Humanities Research Network (including music and composition)---
https://www.humanitiesnetwork.org/
Greatest Dance Scenes 1921 - 2010! ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Tx9mcZldQXU
Bob Jensen's threads on music performances ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm
Writing Tutorials
Bob Jensen's helpers for writers are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob3.htm#Dictionaries
Updates from WebMD ---
http://www.webmd.com/
September 8, 2011
September 9, 2011
Bath Salts' Used to Get High Are Now Illegal
The Best and Worst States for Long-Term Care
CDC: 1,000 Food-Borne Disease Outbreaks in a Year
Study: 1 in 4 People Likely to Develop COPD
Illegal Drug Use on the Rise in U.S.
FDA Advisory Panel Backs Xarelto to Prevent Strokes
Heartburn, Reflux Seen in 9/11 Survivors
FDA: Brazilian Blowout Hair Straightener Is Dangerous
Rheumatoid Arthritis Drugs May Have Small Skin Cancer Risk
Breast-Conserving Therapy Gets Boost for Younger Women
September 12, 2011
September 13, 2011
September 14, 2011
September 15, 2011
September 16, 2011
September 17, 2011
September 20, 2011
September 21, 2011
September 22, 2011
September 23, 2011
September 24, 2011
Optimizing Brain Fitness: Free Video Lecture on How Your Brain Works
Taught by Dr. Richard Restak, The George Washington University School of
Medicine and Health Sciences
http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/special/optimizing-brain-fitness.aspx
Web Site Story ---
http://www.collegehumor.com/moogaloop/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1913584&fullscreen=1
Whose Line Is It Anyway? The Complete Improv Series Now Free Online ---
Click Here
http://www.openculture.com/2011/09/whose_line_is_it_anyway_improv_series_free_online.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29
When You Feel Like You've Had Enough ---
http://dingo.care2.com/cards/flash/5409/galaxy.swf
Forwarded by my friend Dick Haar
Bad news for you
To save the economy on September 18, 2011, Obama announced that he is
ordering the immigration department to start deporting old people (instead of
illegals) in order to lower Social Security and Medicare costs.
Old people are easier to catch, and will not remember how to get back home!
I started crying when I thought of you.
.....see you on the bus.
Forwarded by Debbie (who likes a good party)
LIVING WILL FORM.
I, ____________, being of sound mind and body, do
not wish to be kept alive indefinitely by artificial means. Under no
circumstances should my fate be put in the hands of pinhead partisan
politicians who couldn’t pass ninth-grade biology if their lives depended on
it, or lawyers/doctors/hospitals interested in simply running up the bills.
If a reasonable amount of time passes, and I fail
to ask for at least one of the following:
______a Cold Beer____ a Scotch and soda ______a Bloody Mary ______a Gin and
Tonic _______a Glass of Chardonnay ______a Steak ______Lobster or crab legs
______the remote control ______a bowl of ice cream ______the sports
page______Sex ______or Chocolate: It should be presumed that I won’t ever
get any better.
When such a determination is reached, I hereby
instruct my appointed person and attending physicians to pull the plug, reel
in the tubes, and call it a day. At this point, it is time to call the New
Orleans Jazz Funeral Band to come do their thing at my funeral, and ask all
of my friends to raise their glasses to toast the good times we have had.
Signature:__________________________ Date:
_____
I think I had some of these students in class
after they went to college
Forwarded by Maureen
Children Are Quick
____________________________________
TEACHER: Why are you
late?
STUDENT: Class started
before I got here.
--------------------------------------------------------
TEACHER: Maria, go to the map and find North America ..
MARIA: Here
it is.
TEACHER: Correct. Now class, who discovered America ?
CLASS: Maria.
____________________________________
TEACHER: John, why are you doing your math multiplication on the
floor?
JOHN: You told me to do it without using tables..
__________________________________________
TEACHER: Glenn, how do you spell 'crocodile?'
GLENN: K-R-O-K-O-D-I-A-L'
TEACHER: No, that's wrong
GLENN: Maybe it is wrong, but you asked me how I spell it.
(I Love this child)
____________________________________________
TEACHER: Donald, what is the chemical formula for water?
DONALD: H I J K L M N O.
TEACHER: What are you talking about?
DONALD: Yesterday you said it's H to O.
__________________________________
TEACHER: Winnie, name one important thing we have today that we didn't
have ten years ago.
WINNIE: Me!
__________________________________________
TEACHER: Glen, why do you always get so dirty?
GLEN:
Well, I'm a lot closer to the ground than you are.
_______________________________________
TEACHER: Millie, give me a sentence starting with ' I. '
MILLIE: I is..
TEACHER: No, Millie..... Always say, 'I am.'
MILLIE: All right... 'I am the ninth letter of the alphabet.'
________________________________
TEACHER: George Washington not only chopped down his father's cherry
tree, but also admitted it. Now, Louie, do you know why his father
didn't punish him?
LOUIS: Because George still had the axe in his hand.....
______________________________________
TEACHER: Now, Simon , tell me frankly, do you say prayers before
eating?
SIMON: No sir, I don't have to, my Mom is a good cook.
______________________________
TEACHER: Clyde , your composition on 'My Dog' is exactly the same
as your brother's.. Did you copy his?
CLYDE : No, sir. It's the same dog.
(I want to adopt this kid!!!)
___________________________________
TEACHER: Harold, what do you call a person who keeps on talking when
people
are no longer
interested?
HAROLD: A teacher
Tidbits Archives ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
Click here to search Bob Jensen's web site if you have key words to enter ---
Search Site.
For example if you want to know what Jensen documents have the term "Enron"
enter the phrase Jensen AND Enron. Another search engine that covers Trinity and
other universities is at
http://www.searchedu.com/
Find a College
College Atlas ---
http://www.collegeatlas.org/
Among other things the above site provides acceptance rate percentages
Online Distance Education Training and Education ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm
For-Profit Universities Operating in the Gray
Zone of Fraud (College, Inc.) ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#ForProfitFraud
Shielding Against Validity Challenges in Plato's Cave ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm
-
With a Rejoinder from the 2010 Senior Editor of The Accounting Review
(TAR), Steven J. Kachelmeier
- With Replies in Appendix 4 to Professor Kachemeier by Professors
Jagdish Gangolly and Paul Williams
- With Added Conjectures in Appendix 1 as to Why the Profession of
Accountancy Ignores TAR
- With Suggestions in Appendix 2 for Incorporating Accounting Research
into Undergraduate Accounting Courses
What went wrong in accounting/accountics research?
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm#WhatWentWrong
The Sad State of Accountancy Doctoral
Programs That Do Not Appeal to Most Accountants ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm#DoctoralPrograms
AN ANALYSIS OF THE EVOLUTION OF RESEARCH
CONTRIBUTIONS BY THE ACCOUNTING REVIEW: 1926-2005 ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/395wpTAR/Web/TAR395wp.htm#_msocom_1
Bob Jensen's threads on accounting theory
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm
Tom Lehrer on Mathematical Models and
Statistics ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfZWyUXn3So
Systemic problems of accountancy (especially the
vegetable nutrition paradox) that probably will never be solved ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudConclusion.htm#BadNews
World Clock ---
http://www.peterussell.com/Odds/WorldClock.php
Facts about the earth in real time --- http://www.worldometers.info/
Interesting Online Clock
and Calendar
---
http://home.tiscali.nl/annejan/swf/timeline.swf
Time by Time Zones ---
http://timeticker.com/
Projected Population Growth (it's out of control) ---
http://geography.about.com/od/obtainpopulationdata/a/worldpopulation.htm
Also see
http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/P/Populations.html
Facts about population growth (video) ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMcfrLYDm2U
Projected U.S. Population Growth ---
http://www.carryingcapacity.org/projections75.html
Real time meter of the U.S. cost of the war in Iraq ---
http://www.costofwar.com/
Enter you zip code to get Census Bureau comparisons ---
http://zipskinny.com/
Sure wish there'd be a little good news today.
Free (updated) Basic Accounting Textbook --- search for Hoyle at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks
CPA Examination ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cpa_examination
Free CPA Examination Review Course Courtesy of Joe Hoyle ---
http://cpareviewforfree.com/
Rick Lillie's education, learning, and technology blog is at
http://iaed.wordpress.com/
Accounting News, Blogs, Listservs, and Social
Networking ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/AccountingNews.htm
Bob Jensen's Threads ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called New
Bookmarks ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called
Tidbits ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called Fraud
Updates ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
Online Books, Poems, References,
and Other Literature
In the past I've provided links to various types electronic literature available
free on the Web.
I created a page that summarizes those various links ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm
Some of Bob Jensen's Tutorials
Accounting program news items for colleges are posted at
http://www.accountingweb.com/news/college_news.html
Sometimes the news items provide links to teaching resources for accounting
educators.
Any college may post a news item.
Accountancy Discussion ListServs:
For an elaboration on the reasons you should join a
ListServ (usually for free) go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm
AECM (Educators)
http://pacioli.loyola.edu/aecm/
AECM is an email Listserv list which
provides a forum for discussions of all hardware and software
which can be useful in any way for accounting education at the
college/university level. Hardware includes all platforms and
peripherals. Software includes spreadsheets, practice sets,
multimedia authoring and presentation packages, data base
programs, tax packages, World Wide Web applications, etc
Roles of a ListServ ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm
|
CPAS-L (Practitioners)
http://pacioli.loyola.edu/cpas-l/
CPAS-L provides a forum for discussions of
all aspects of the practice of accounting. It provides an
unmoderated environment where issues, questions, comments,
ideas, etc. related to accounting can be freely discussed.
Members are welcome to take an active role by posting to CPAS-L
or an inactive role by just monitoring the list. You qualify for
a free subscription if you are either a CPA or a professional
accountant in public accounting, private industry, government or
education. Others will be denied access. |
Yahoo
(Practitioners)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xyztalk
This forum is for CPAs to discuss the activities of the AICPA.
This can be anything from the CPA2BIZ portal to the XYZ
initiative or anything else that relates to the AICPA. |
AccountantsWorld
http://accountantsworld.com/forums/default.asp?scope=1
This site hosts various discussion groups on such topics as
accounting software, consulting, financial planning, fixed
assets, payroll, human resources, profit on the Internet, and
taxation. |
Business Valuation
Group
BusValGroup-subscribe@topica.com
This discussion group is headed by Randy Schostag
[RSchostag@BUSVALGROUP.COM] |
Many useful accounting sites (scroll down) ---
http://www.iasplus.com/links/links.htm
Bob Jensen's Sort-of Blogs ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/JensenBlogs.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called New
Bookmarks ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called
Tidbits ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called Fraud
Updates ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
Some
Accounting History Sites
Bob Jensen's
Accounting History in a Nutshell and Links ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm#AccountingHistory
Accounting
History Libraries at the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) ---
http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/accountancy/libraries.html
The above libraries include international accounting history.
The above libraries include film and video historical collections.
MAAW Knowledge Portal for Management and Accounting ---
http://maaw.info/
Academy of Accounting Historians and the Accounting Historians Journal ---
http://www.accounting.rutgers.edu/raw/aah/
Sage Accounting History ---
http://ach.sagepub.com/cgi/pdf_extract/11/3/269
A nice timeline on the development of U.S. standards and the evolution of
thinking about the income statement versus the balance sheet is provided at:
"The Evolution of U.S. GAAP: The Political Forces Behind Professional
Standards (1930-1973)," by Stephen A. Zeff, CPA Journal, January 2005
---
http://www.nysscpa.org/cpajournal/2005/105/infocus/p18.htm
Part II covering years 1974-2003 published in February 2005 ---
http://www.nysscpa.org/cpajournal/2005/205/index.htm
A nice
timeline of accounting history ---
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/2187711/A-HISTORY-OF-ACCOUNTING
From Texas
A&M University
Accounting History Outline ---
http://acct.tamu.edu/giroux/history.html
Bob
Jensen's timeline of derivative financial instruments and hedge accounting ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudRotten.htm#DerivativesFrauds
History of
Fraud in America ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/415wp/AmericanHistoryOfFraud.htm
Also see
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Fraud.htm
More of Bob Jensen's Pictures and
Stories
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
All
my online pictures ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/PictureHistory/
Professor Robert E. Jensen (Bob)
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen
190 Sunset Hill Road
Sugar Hill, NH 03586
Phone: 603-823-8482
Email:
rjensen@trinity.edu