Tidbits on October 29, 2014
Bob Jensen
at Trinity University
This week I feature
Wes Lavin's
2014 Foliage Photographs
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/Foliage/Set17/FoliageSet08.htm
Stapelia (Star
Flower) ---
http://inthewinecountry.blogspot.com/2010/09/something-stinky.html
Tidbits on October 15,, 2014
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/
More of Bob Jensen's Pictures and
Stories
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
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
Favorite Poem Project (videos of 50 USA poets) ---
http://www.favoritepoem.org
Different From the Others (1919): The First Gay Rights Movie Ever … Later
Destroyed by the Nazis ---
Click Here
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/FwwuWd-NRuw/different-from-the-others-1919-the-first-gay-rights-movie-in-history.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
New Animated Web Series Makes the Theory of Evolution Easy to
Understand ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/DqtfW6iSYmQ/new-animated-web-series-makes-the-theory-of-evolution-easy-to-understand.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Hear Michel Foucault’s Final UC Berkeley Lectures, “Discourse
and Truth” (1983) ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/4Ntvxk910iY/michel-foucaults-final-uc-berkeley-lectures-discourse-and-truth-1983.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Here's An Amazing Video Of Osprey And Harrier Jets Refueling
Over The Mediterranean ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/osprey-and-harrier-jets-refueling-2014-10
explore (videos on exploration) ---
http://explore.org
Double Rainbow ---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MX0D4oZwCsA
The Squirrel versus the Hawk (amazing footage) ---
https://www.youtube.com/v/XBEyCr5AoIs
Jensen Comment
Where we live in the White Mountains we have chipmunks and ground squirrels, but
we really don't have squirrels that nest in trees. I blame that on the many
crows and hawks in these mountains.
Toby Dammit: Fellini’s Masterful Short Film, Based on a Tale
by Edgar Allan Poe (1968) ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/FDhi0bOcHSs/toby-dammit-fellinis-masterful-short-film.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Free music downloads ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm
The US Marine And Korean Army Bands Had An Awesome Drum Battle
---
http://www.businessinsider.com/us-marine-korea-army-band-drum-battle-2014-10
Animated Sheet Music of 3 Charlie Parker Jazz
Classics: “Confirmation,” “Au Privave” & “Bloomdido” ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/apgfKIzGo8A/animated-sheet-music-of-3-charlie-parker-jazz-classics.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
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
Pandora (my favorite online music station) ---
www.pandora.com
TheRadio (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's threads on nearly all types of free
music selections online ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Music.htm
Photographs and Art
These Incredible Photos Show Why Tasmania Is One Of The Best
Regions To Explore In 2015 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/these-incredible-photos-show-why-tasmania-is-one-of-the-best-regions-to-explore-in-2015-2014-10
Photos of Hiroshima by Hiroshima Mon Amour Star
Emmanuelle Riva (1958) ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/1YZsdN7dkw4/photos-of-hiroshima-by-hiroshima-mon-amour-star-emmanuelle-riva.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Here's Why You Shouldn't Trust The Pictures On Hotel Websites
---
http://www.businessinsider.com/photoshopped-hotel-photos-2014-10
26 Stunning Images You Won't Believe Were Found On Google
Street View
http://www.businessinsider.com/26-stunning-images-you-wont-believe-were-found-on-google-street-view-2014-10
Jarring Time-Lapse Maps Show How Much The World Has Changed In
The Last 30 Years ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/time-lapse-maps-google-earth-engine-2014-10
Go Aboard A Fleet Of Military Ghost Ships Decaying Off The
Coast Of San Francisco ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/mothball-fleet-of-decaying-ships-off-coast-of-san-francisco-2014-10
14 Awesome Snapshots From Some Of Instagram's Coolest Travel
Photographers ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/instagrams-coolest-travel-photographers-2014-10
The Arts at MIT ---
http://arts.mit.edu
Striking Photo Sums Up The Immigration Crisis On The Spain-Morocco Border ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/photo-of-moroccan-immigrants-in-melilla-spain-2014-10
The Life of a City: Early Films of New York, 1898-1906 ---
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/papr/nychome.html
New-York Historical Society, Photographs of New York City and
Beyond ---
http://cdm16694.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/p16124coll2
Long Island Collection ---
http://guides.library.stonybrook.edu/long_islan
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
Favorite Poem Project (videos of 50 USA poets) ---
http://www.favoritepoem.org
39 Classic Books Every Modern Gentleman Needs To Read ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/classic-books-modern-gentleman-2014-10
Children’s Books ---
http://childrensbooks.about.com
Other Children's Books (mostly Free) ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Children
The First 500 Books From The Vatican Library's Massive
Digitization Project Are Now Online ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-first-500-books-from-the-vatican-librarys-massive-digitisation-project-are-now-online-2014-10
Download The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Macabre
Stories as Free eBooks & Audio Books ---
Click Here
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/3_2ZvPhZOCg/download-the-complete-works-of-edgar-allan-poe-macabre-stories-as-free-ebooks-audio-books.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Hear Beowulf Read In the Original Old English: How Many Words
Do You Recognize? ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/y68DYshCUa8/hear-beowulf-read-in-the-original-old-english.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Free Electronic Literature ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm
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 October 29, 2014
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2014/TidbitsQuotations102914.htm
U.S. National Debt Clock ---
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Also see
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
Peter G.
Peterson Website on Deficit/Debt Solutions ---
http://www.pgpf.org/
GAO: Fiscal Outlook & The Debt ---
http://www.gao.gov/fiscal_outlook/overview
Bob Jensen's threads on entitlements ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Entitlements.htm
Bob Jensen's health care messaging updates ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm
"The Science Behind Social Security Benefits Calculations," by
Theodore J. Sarenski, AICPA, October 20, 2014 ---
http://blog.aicpa.org/2014/10/the-science-behind-social-security-benefits-calculations.html#sthash.t77ImEv5.i4UykguJ.dpuf
While the Social Security Administration calculates
Social Security benefits, it is your due diligence to know the basics so
that you can understand how an additional year of earning will affect your
clients’ projected benefit.
Continued in article-
Jensen Comment
This is more about understanding the regulations than science. The regulations
are a bit complicated.
Bob Jensen's personal finance helpers ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#InvestmentHelpers
Wolfram Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine ---
http://www.wolframalpha.com
Bob Jensen's Illustrations on the Use of Wolfram Alpha in Cost Accounting
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theorylearningcurves.htm
"23 Ways To Make Money Using The Nerdiest Site (Wolfram Alpha) On The
Internet," by Walter Hickey, Business Insider, July 9, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-use-wolfram-alpha-for-finance-2013-7
Developed by the "Smartest Guy on the Planet"
"32 Tricks You Can Do With Wolfram Alpha, The Most Useful Site In The History
Of The Internet," by Walter Hickey, Business Insider, July 9, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/awesome-things-you-can-do-with-wolfram-alpha-2013-7
"The 25 Best College Professors In America," by Peter Jacobs,
Business
Insider, October 21, 2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/best-college-professors-2014-10
I think it's mostly baloney except for possibly motivating weak and
disinterested students!
Firstly, the ratings come from only students who self selected to post to
RateMyProfessor.com. The majority of a professor's
students do not report to that site. It's more like an election
where less than 1% of the voters bothered to vote.
Secondly, nearly all the "top professors" selected by RateMyProfessors
are also rated as "easy" by the
respondents. Easy professors are often great at inspiring unmotivated students,
but they are not rated so high by top students who tend not to report to
RateMyProfessors.com.
Thirdly, evidence shows that some professors
encourage their students to send in reports to
RateMyProfessor.com. Perhaps the best professors in higher education do not even
mention this site to their students and even more importantly do not even know
about the site themselves or care.
Get the details directly from RateMyProfessor.com at
http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/blog/toplist?posturl=/top-professors-of-2013-2014/
Jensen Comment
Having said this, I frequently go to RateMyProfessors.com. I don't care
two hoots about the numerical scores except maybe the "easiness" scores. What
interests me are the verbal comments by individual students. These can be
revealing about such things as the political bias that a teacher brings into the
class. These can be revealing about extraneous content that a professor brings
into the classroom, content that is not particularly relevant to the curriculum
design. These can be revealing of the pedagogy of a teacher. These can be
revealing about the use of education technology.
A roundup of the most interesting stories from other sites, collected by
the staff at MIT Technology Review. ---
Click Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/531986/recommended-from-around-the-web-week-ending-october-24-2014/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20141024
Jensen Question
Does an obsession with playing chess really shrink your brain?
Does an obsession for the AECM really shrink your brain?
(I think it's more of an aging thing.)
(Maybe should be re-titled as "The Graduate Spouse")
A classic case was for accounting professor Doug Snowball at the
University of Florida. For years he worked full time as an accounting professor,
raised several children, and supported his wife who commuted through 7+ years of
medical school and residency at Stanford University on the opposite coast.
Programs to Help You Avoid a Foreclosure Crisis ---
Click Here
http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/money-finance/real-estate/programs-to-help-you-avoid-a-foreclosure-crisis?utm_source=MG20141023&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=moneygirl
Question
Is it time to once again refinance your home?
"US Mortgage Rates Sink To A 16-Month Low," by Andy Kiersz,
Business Insider, October 23, 2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/freddie-mac-mortgage-rates-392-2014-10
. . .
The standard 30-year fixed rate mortgage fell to
3.92% for the week ending October 23, down 0.05% from the previous week.
Also falling were 15-year fixed rate mortgages, from 3.18% last week to
3.08% this week, and 5-year Treasury-indexed hybrid adjustable rate
mortgages, down to 2.91% this week from 2.92% last week.
Meanwhile, 1-year Treasury-indexed adjustable rate
mortgages ticked slightly up, from 2.38% last week to 2.41% this week.
Read more:
http://www.businessinsider.com/freddie-mac-mortgage-rates-392-2014-10#ixzz3GzstgsIH
Jensen Comment
Remember that that there are usually up-front costs to financing and refinancing
you home such that home buyers and homeowners should get estimates on mortgage
deals. Begin with a reputable local bank before looking elsewhere for a lender.
The local alternative may run higher, but the local alternative may also be more
honest about all the fees involved. I've refinanced our cottage three times
locally since buying it in 2003. I don't think I will refinance again until
rates drop a bit lower.
I recommend avoiding adjustable-rate mortgages unless you you are willing to
take on more financial risk of having to refinance at higher rates down the
road. The risk is that the government will come to its senses about interest
rates. But it sometimes does not make sense to expect the government to come to
its senses about much of anything. If you intend to sell the home in a year or
two, remember to factor in those costs of refinancing into an adjustable-rate
mortgage. Always look at the future in terms of various scenarios before
investing and borrowing.
Large-Sample Asymptotics in Three Blog Postings by David Giles
Illustrating Asymptotic
Behaviour - Part III
This is the third in a
sequence of posts about some basic concepts relating to
large-sample asymptotics and the linear regression model. The
first two posts (here
and
here) dealt with items 1 and 2 in
the following list, and you'll find it helpful to read them
before proceeding with this post:
- The consistency of
the OLS estimator in a situation where it's known to be
biased in small samples.
- The correct way to
think about the asymptotic distribution of the
OLS estimator.
- A comparison of the
OLS estimator and another estimator, in terms of asymptotic
efficiency.
Here, we're going to deal with item 3, again
via a
small Monte Carlo experiment, using EViews.
Jensen Comment
These three blog posts by David Giles are especially important to accountics
scientists who typically have very large samples from purchased databases.
Common Accountics Science and Econometric
Science Statistical Mistakes ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/temp/AccounticsScienceStatisticalMistakes.htm
Jensen Comment
Since over 62% of college teachers do not have tenure, it's much easier to fire
bad college teachers than bad K-12 teachers,
virtually all of whom are protected by highly militant unions
Rotten Apples: It's Nearly Impossible to Fire a Bad Teacher
(even ones that only show up for work half the time)
"Taking on Teacher Tenure," by Haley Sweetland and Edwards, Time Magazine,
November 3, 2014, pp. 34-39 ---
http://time.com/3533556/the-war-on-teacher-tenure/
It’s really difficult to fire a bad teacher. A
group of Silicon Valley investors wants to change that Popular Among
Subscribers Teacher Tenure Time Magazine Cover The War on Teacher Tenure
Subscribe 12 Answers To Ebola’s Hard Questions Why Kobani Matters
On a warm day in early June, a Los Angeles County
trial-court judge, Rolf M. Treu, pink-cheeked beneath a trim white beard,
dropped a bombshell on the American public-school system. Ruling in Vergara
v. California, Treu struck down five decades-old California laws governing
teacher tenure and other job protections on the grounds that they violate
the state’s constitution.
In his 4,000-word decision, he bounded through an
unusually short explanation of what was an unprecedented interpretation of
the law. Step 1: Tenure and other job protections make it harder to fire
teachers and therefore effectively work to keep bad ones in the classroom.
Step 2: Bad teachers “substantially undermine” a child’s education. That,
Treu wrote, not only “shocks the conscience” but also violates the students’
right to a “basic equality of educational opportunity” as enshrined in
California’s constitution. Popular Among Subscribers Teacher Tenure Time
Magazine Cover The War on Teacher Tenure 12 Answers To Ebola’s Hard
Questions Why Kobani Matters
It was the first time, in California or anywhere
else, that a court had linked the quality of a teacher, as measured by
student test scores, to a pupil’s right to an education. What happened next
was predictable: the educational establishment hit DEFCON 1. State and
national teachers’ unions decried the ruling as part of a subversive effort
to destroy labor unions and pointed, truthfully, to the fact that the
lawsuit was launched and underwritten by a Silicon Valley muckety-muck who
lives in one of the fanciest ZIP codes in America. Others painted Treu, who
was appointed by Republican Governor Pete Wilson, as a brazen partisan.
Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and former D.C.
chancellor of schools Michelle Rhee praised the decision for challenging the
“broken status quo.” Other education reformers, including former CNN anchor
turned education activist Campbell Brown, pronounced it the most important
civil rights suit in decades and filed two copycat cases in New York.
On some level, these reactions were premature.
Treu’s decision holds no precedent-setting power and won’t affect any
California law unless an appeals court upholds the ruling sometime next
year. Both the state and the teachers’ unions have appealed and are awaiting
a trial date. But on another level, the Vergara case is a powerful proxy for
a broader war over the future of education in this country. The reform
movement today is led not by grassroots activists or union leaders but by
Silicon Valley business types and billionaires. It is fought not through
ballot boxes or on the floors of hamstrung state legislatures but in
closed-door meetings and at courthouses. And it will not be won
incrementally, through painstaking compromise with multiple stakeholders,
but through sweeping decisions–judicial and otherwise–made possible by the
tactical application of vast personal fortunes.
It is a reflection of our politics that no one
elected these men to take on the knotty problem of fixing our public
schools, but here they are anyway, fighting for what they firmly believe is
in the public interest. David Welch, the 53-year-old engineer and
businessman behind Vergara, is the least well known of a half-dozen tech
titans who are making the repair of public education something of a second
career. In the past 15 years, Microsoft’s Bill Gates has poured billions
into everything from helping states write and implement the Common Core
State Standards to building a new history curriculum. Facebook’s Mark
Zuckerberg has dropped $220 million on public schools in Newark, N.J., and
the San Francisco Bay Area, while Netflix’s Reed Hastings has spent millions
more on buttressing the charter-school movement in California and beyond.
For the past four years, PayPal’s Peter Thiel has been divvying out dozens
of $100,000 “scholarships” to kids who are willing to ditch university in
favor of “self-education.”
This latest batch of tech tycoons turned education
reformers follows in the footsteps of a long line of older magnates, from
the Carnegies and Rockefellers to Walmart’s Waltons, who have also funneled
their fortunes into education-reform projects built on private-sector
management strategies. While this newer class of tech philanthropists are in
some ways similar to the older generation, they also come to school reform
having been steeped in the uniquely modern, libertarian, free-market Wild
West of tech entrepreneurship–a world where data and innovation are king,
disruption is a way of life, and the gridlock and rules of modern politics
are regarded as a kind of kryptonite to how society ought to be.
“Life in a Silicon Valley operation is, O.K., we
need to change something. How do I create an agent of change?” Welch
explains, sitting in a windowless boardroom at the Cupertino, Calif.,
headquarters of his company, Infinera, which makes fiber-optic
communications technology. “But here you have the most important aspect of
society, in my mind at least–the ability to educate our children–and it’s
incapable of change. It’s failing, and it doesn’t want to acknowledge that
it’s failing, much less do anything about it.”
“Why Isn’t Anyone Fixing This?”
Of all the Silicon Valley tycoons you might expect
to make headlines, Welch is near the bottom of the list. Even in the geeky
back alleys of Palo Alto, his name doesn’t always ring a bell. He doesn’t
give TED talks, he doesn’t headline coding conferences, and his company is
hardly a well-known brand. The unassuming father of three, who has bushy
eyebrows and the well-ironed, air-conditioned look of the well-to-do, earned
a Ph.D. from Cornell in electrical engineering and made his many millions
working at two startups in Silicon Valley. Neither a Democrat nor a
Republican, he clearly prefers a world of concrete facts to taking sides. “I
don’t believe in putting on a jacket that says I’m red or blue,” he says. “I
believe in identifying the topics that are important to me and then figuring
out the right way to talk about them.”
As the youngest of seven children growing up
outside Annapolis, Md., Welch went to public school and then to the
University of Delaware. He didn’t think much about how the system actually
functioned, or malfunctioned, until his own children were born in the ’90s
and went on to have “some public experiences and some private-school
experiences.” (Welch, as a rule, doesn’t talk about his children’s lives.)
He then became involved in the NewSchools Venture Fund, which invests in
charter schools and other entrepreneur-led education ventures targeting
under-served students, and StudentsFirst, the controversial nonprofit
founded by Michelle Rhee. But even by the early 2000s he’d homed in on what
he saw as the root of the systemic failure of California’s public schools:
the state’s laws on teacher tenure and other job protections, which are
among the strictest in the country.
It seemed crazy to Welch that teachers in
California receive tenure–permanent employment status designed to protect
them from unfair dismissal–after less than two years on the job and that
principals are often required to lay off the least experienced teachers
first, no matter which ones are the best. It seemed even crazier to him that
in some districts it takes years and tens of thousands of dollars to fire a
teacher who isn’t doing a good job. Welch remembers asking a big-city
California superintendent to tell him the one thing he needed to improve the
public-school system. The answer blew Welch away. The educator didn’t ask
for more money or more iPads. “He said, ‘Give me control over my
workforce,'” Welch said. “It just made so much sense. I thought, Why isn’t
anyone doing something about that? Why isn’t anyone fixing this?”
In early 2010, Welch decided, as he puts it, to
“jump off the cliff” and do something about it. His first move was to meet
with Kathleen Sullivan, a constitutional lawyer whose name is sometimes
whispered to be on the Democrats’ short list of nominees for the U.S.
Supreme Court. He pitched her what was at the time a rather unformed idea.
“I said, ‘Here’s my premise–if children are being harmed by these laws, then
something, somewhere, is being done that’s illegal,'” Welch says. After
about six months, Sullivan and a small team of lawyers in San Francisco
delivered a draft of the legal theory that would become the foundation for
Vergara.
Welch’s next move, in April 2011, was to hire a
jack-of-all-trades public relations firm, which is now called Rally. It
launched a nonprofit, Students Matter–branded in the bright yellow and black
of a No. 2 pencil–that was tasked with two missions. The first was to build
a coalition of supporters and funders and create a public campaign
surrounding the case. The second was to find a team of lawyers who were
willing to reverse engineer a lawsuit on the basis of an untested legal
theory on behalf of plaintiffs who didn’t yet exist.
Building on Brown
Before states began passing tenure laws in the
early 20th century, a teacher could be fired for holding unorthodox
political views or attending the wrong church, or for no reason at all if
the local party boss wanted to pass on the job to someone else. But what
began as a popular idea has become increasingly controversial as countless
stories of schools and districts being unable to fire bad teachers have
populated the news. In a story that hit headlines in 2009, the L.A. Unified
School District was legally barred from firing a teacher who told an
eighth-grade student who had recently tried to slit his own wrists to “carve
deeper next time.” Episodes like that help explain why even in California,
where the electorate votes overwhelmingly Democratic and is often
sympathetic to unions, recent polls show that voters are skeptical of
tenure.
Part of Students Matter’s job was to take this
commonly held but abstract idea–that tenure and other job protections do not
serve the public-school system–and essentially personify it in the form of
students on whose behalf the case would be filed. Among the nine plaintiffs,
who ranged from elementary-school to high-school age, were Beatriz and
Elizabeth Vergara, sisters from Pacoima, Calif., who were 15 and 16 years
old when they took the witness stand this year. Beatriz, the lead plaintiff,
testified about three of her middle-school teachers, describing them as
apathetic, verbally abusive or simply ineffective. “It was always loud in
there, and [he] would even sleep during class,” Beatriz said of her
sixth-grade math teacher. “He didn’t even teach, and he couldn’t control his
class. I couldn’t hear anything because of how loud it was.”
Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, a white-shoe firm based in
Los Angeles, then built the case on a foundation of Brown v. Board of
Education–the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision that ruled that separate is
not equal–and California Supreme Court cases from the 1970s and 1990s. Each
of the California cases interpreted the equal-protection clause in the state
constitution to mean that one group of students should not receive an
education inferior to that offered to another group. For example, in a 1992
case, Butt v. State of California, the California Supreme Court found that
when a school district with a budget shortfall decided to save money by
dismissing students for summer vacation six weeks early, it violated the
state constitution, since students at the schools with the shorter school
year received an education that was inferior to that of students at schools
with full school years.
The argument in Vergara v. California took that
same idea but added a controversial twist. Instead of examining the equality
of students’ educational opportunities by comparing discrete facts–like the
amount of time spent in class or the amount of funding a school receives per
student–Welch’s lawyers made the case that the court should compare the
quality of students’ in-class learning experiences. They argued that
students who are stuck in classrooms with bad teachers receive an education
that is substantially inferior to that of students who are in classrooms
with good teachers. Laws that keep bad teachers in the classroom, they
concluded, therefore violate the equal-protection clause of the state
constitution. They also argued that poor and minority students, who are more
likely to be in classrooms with bad teachers, endure a disproportionate
burden, making the issue a matter of civil rights as well.
Happily for Welch’s lawyers, their innovative
argument happened to coincide with a flood of new academic research on
teacher quality that could serve as evidence in court. A three-year study
led by Harvard education expert Thomas Kane, with funding from the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation, found that a bad teacher, as measured by his or
her students’ test scores, could set a student’s educational progress back
by 9.54 months. In December 2011, another study, by Harvard University’s Raj
Chetty and John Friedman with Columbia University’s Jonah Rockoff, looked at
school records, test scores and tax returns for 2.5 million children and
young adults from the past two decades. Using a controversial tool called
value-added measures (VAM) to control for factors like race and poverty
rates, they found that replacing a poorly performing teacher with an
excellent one could increase students’ lifetime earnings by $250,000 per
classroom. “The fact that we could show how students were actually harmed by
bad teachers–that changed the argument,” says Marcellus McRae, an attorney
on the case.
The Vergara trial began in January of this year and
stretched over two months in court. More than a few times, teachers and
administrators called by the defense to represent the position of the
teachers’ unions found themselves in cross-examination inadvertently
buttressing Students Matter’s case instead. As Judge Treu later noted,
nearly every witness agreed under oath that competent teachers are among the
most important components of a child’s in-school educational experience and
that “grossly ineffective teachers substantially undermine the ability of
that child to succeed in school.” The trial ended March 27, and on June 10,
Treu handed down his tentative decision.
In his 19 years on the bench, Treu’s opinions
rarely made news, but this one would be an exception. If roughly 1% to 3% of
California teachers are in the bottom 5% of competence, Treu wrote, citing
witness testimony, that means there are between 2,750 and 8,250 such
teachers currently in California classrooms. That population, Treu wrote,
“has a direct, real, appreciable and negative impact on a significant number
of California students, now and well into the future for as long as said
teachers hold their positions.” In the law office near the courthouse, Welch
and dozens of supporters erupted in celebration, hugging and kissing and
crying.
What Comes Next?
The Vergara decision has been the source of outsize
drama in California’s election cycle this year, playing out on stages both
small and large. The battle for state superintendent of public
instruction–not the kind of race that usually garners the big bucks–has
already attracted as much as $10 million from state and national teachers’
unions on one side and wealthy donors on the other. Union-backed incumbent
Tom Torlakson, who has decried the Vergara decision as a soulless attack on
teachers and vowed to see it overturned on appeal, is now within a
hairbreadth of losing to Marshall Tuck, a Silicon Valley–backed reformer,
who has celebrated Vergara as a major win for California kids. Tuck’s
deep-pocketed supporters spent $4.5 million in just the first two weeks of
October. Meanwhile, Governor Jerry Brown, who is up for re-election in
November and counts the teachers’ unions among his biggest political
backers, has negotiated a careful middle road. While he has dutifully
appealed Treu’s decision in the case, he was careful to avoid earning the
ire of the Silicon Valley set. “Changes of this magnitude, as a matter of
law and policy, require appellate review,” Brown’s office wrote in the
notice of appeal, an exercise in blandness.
Continued in article
Rethinking Tenure, Dissertations, and Scholarship
Academic Publishing in the Digital Age
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies2.htm#MLA
Obsolete and Dysfunctional System of Tenure
Over 62% of Full-Time Faculty Are Off the Tenure Track
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies2.htm#Tenure
Gaming for Tenure as an Accounting Professor ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTenure.htm
(with a reply about tenure publication point systems from Linda Kidwell)
From the CPA Newsletter on October 24, 2014
IRS needs to take more steps to ensure health insurance
exchanges are safe, report finds
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/ghptBYbWhBCKoUvDCidKtxCicNxDHD?format=standard
The Internal
Revenue Service needs more assurance that the taxpayer information it
provides to state-based insurance exchanges created under the Affordable
Care Act is secure, according to a
report
from the Treasury Inspector General for
Tax Administration. The IRS does not require state exchanges to carry out an
initial security check before receiving tax information, the report notes,
or take other measures such as on-site reviews or promises in writing from
state exchange officials about security.
The Hill (10/23)
Bob
Jensen's universal health care messaging ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm
Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase
it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things,
it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.
Henry David Thoreau
Bill Gates Is Obsessed With A New Way Of Teaching History — Here's How It
Works ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-big-history-2014-10
Take Big History: A Free Short Course on 13.8 Billion Years of History,
Funded by Bill Gates ---
http://www.openculture.com/2014/10/big-history-free-short-course.html
bioRxiv.org (in the era of technology research publishing is still in a horse
and buggy age ---
http://biorxiv.org
Example: A forthcoming paper in The Accounting Review took 11
months to be accepted after first being submitted. It will take more months to
be published after acceptance. Like many papers published initially in SSRN the
eventual publishing in research journals proceeds at a horse and buggy pace.
SSRN ---
http://www.ssrn.com/en/
bioRxiv.org ---
http://biorxiv.org
bioRxiv (pronounced "bio-archive") is a free online
archive and distribution service for unpublished preprints in the life
sciences. It is operated by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, a not-for-profit
research and educational institution. By posting preprints on bioRxiv,
authors are able to make their findings immediately available to the
scientific community and receive feedback on draft manuscripts before they
are submitted to journals.
Steve Ballmer ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Ballmer
"Steve Ballmer Paid $2
Billion For The Clippers, But He Might Get Half That Back In Tax Breaks," by
Myles Udland, Business Insider, October 27, 2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/steve-ballmer-la-clippers-tax-break-report-2014-10
Former Microsoft CEO is now
Professor Ballmer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business
"Steve Ballmer Goes to College: On Campus With Stanford's New Professor,"
by Ashley Vance, Bloomberg Businessweek, October 21, 2014 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-10-21/steve-ballmer-at-stanford-a-conversation-with-a-new-mba-professor?campaign_id=DN102114
Jensen Comment
After buying the LA Clippers for a couple of billion dollars he probably has to
moonlight for the salary. I wonder if he's up to the publish or perish world of
the Academy.
Online Statistics Education (including resources for teachers)
---
http://onlinestatbook.com/2/
Introduction to Statistical Thinking (With R, Without Calculus) ---
http://pluto.huji.ac.il/~msby/StatThink/IntroStat.pdf
StatsTeachR ---
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kE1jZcJhBgM/U1vQwFH-ZVI/AAAAAAAACX8/ca6nLTAtP8U/s1600/Capture.GIF
Econometrician David Giles claims this is a great resource ---
http://davegiles.blogspot.com/2014/04/great-resource-for-teaching-statistics.html
Use Plickers for quick checks for understanding to know whether your
students are understanding big concepts and mastering key skills ---
https://www.plickers.com/
Thank you Sharon Garvin for the heads up.
Bob Jensen's threads on response pads and clickers ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#ResponsePads
Bob Jensen's threads on tricks and tools of the trade ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm
Flipped Teaching ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flipped_classroom
Jensen Comment
By now you are probably weary of articles about flipped classrooms. This one is
a bit more interesting, however, since it entails flipping the large lecture
courses in a famous Ivy League university (Columbia University) ---
http://campustechnology.com/articles/2014/10/22/flipping-the-lecture-hall.aspx
There's no question that the flipped classroom
model has become all the rage at colleges and universities across the
country. In fact, in the most recent
Horizon Report,
the New Media Consortium (NMC) called the flipped
classroom one of the most important emerging trends in educational
technology for higher education, noting, "The model is becoming increasingly
popular in higher education institutions because of how it rearranges
face-to-face instruction for professors and students, creating a more
efficient and enriching use of class time."
Yet with all the flipped classroom's potential for
active, collaborative learning and increased interaction between professors
and students, there's still one bastion of higher education that has
resisted the trend: the large lecture course.
With the large lecture format, said NMC Senior
Communications Director Samantha Becker, "it's really hard to personalize
the material so that a student can feel like they have ownership over their
own learning process." And, she added, "It's hard to speak up. There's
always the fear of being ostracized by other students or feeling like asking
stupid questions."
Maurice Matiz, executive director of Columbia
University's (NY)
Columbia Center for
New Media Teaching and Learning, agreed: "Sitting
in one of these 180-student classrooms is a very passive situation," he
said. "We've found that students aren't really learning very much."
Matiz and his colleagues are out to change that —
by finding ways to adopt the flipped classroom model to traditional large
lecture courses.
The Big Flip
They started last year with Associate Professsor
Brent Stockwell's biochemistry class of 180 students. Stockwell was
discouraged by the number of students who were not completing the required
reading assignments before coming to class and, thus, were unprepared to get
the most out of his lectures.
So, in the fall 2013 semester, he began creating
weekly slide presentations using PowerPoint and the screen-recording
application
ScreenFlow. He would upload the videos to YouTube,
then embed them into the syllabus section of the online learning management
system and invite students to watch. Stockwell also placed a link to a short
quiz underneath the video player on the syllabus page. Since the quiz
results counted toward students' grades, he was assured that most students
would watch the video and come to the following day's class prepared.
"[The quiz] is something we learned to do with our
MOOCs, and then applied to what we do on campus," said Matiz, who helped
Stockwell organize the flipped class.
The flipped format allowed Stockwell to delve
deeper and in new directions with the live content he presented in class. He
also incorporated a polling service called
Socrative
that students could access on their mobile devices.
Students could respond to questions anonymously in real time, giving him a
sense of whether they understood the concepts presented to them, allowing
him to revisit a difficult topic or move on to other material.
Then he divided the class of 180 into groups of
five and, for part of each class, he would give them problems to work on
together, such as how a specific fatty acid should be labeled or how to
predict the mechanism of an action of a drug based on the results of an
experiment.
The group work led to livelier discussions and
forced students to synthesize and apply information from the textbook,
videos and classroom discussion.
"What I particularly appreciated about Professor
Stockwell is the way he wove all the different components together," NMC's
Becker said. "He countered the size of the class by grouping people together
and allowing for anonymous polling through the response feature."
Deciding to try an even larger class, Matiz moved
on to Professor Rachel Gordon's Body, Health and Disease class of 250 in
Columbia's College
of Physicians and Surgeons. Gordon also used short
video lectures students could view before class, reserving class time for
discussions of case studies with an audience response system. She would poll
students after covering a concept and, if less than 50 percent of students
chose correct answers, she would ask them to break into small groups to
discuss their choices.
Typically, she said, the peer discussions would
lead to increases in accuracy when students were polled a second time.
"On many levels it was more satisfying than
lecturing, where you don't really know if the students are 'getting it,'"
Gordon said. "I hope that more teachers will take the plunge. It's worth
it."
Challenges
One challenge that Matiz and Stockwell encountered
with applying the flipped classroom model to large courses: the physical
limitations of spaces that are not inherently designed for small group work.
"This is an old university," Matiz said, "over 250
years old. A lot of the classrooms are traditional classrooms. Many of them
even still have desks that are bolted to the floor."
Nevertheless, Stockwell made it work. "If you're
willing to deal with those issues, you can still do it," Matiz said.
Fortunately for Gordon, the Columbia medical school
has a relatively new campus and entire sets of classrooms that were built
with collaboration in mind.
Stockwell also noted that the biggest challenge he
had in the first year was running out of difficult, thought-provoking
problems and case studies to give his students when they broke up into small
groups. To resolve that challenge in this, his second year of using the
flipped classroom model with the biochemistry course, he has called on other
biochemistry professors in the New York area to build a repository of
problem sets that can be shared.
Despite the difficulties, Matiz said, the command
of material by students during and at the end of the course was so obvious
to Stockwell and Gordon that he is convinced of the benefits of the flipped
classroom in college and university courses.
"There are so many advantages," Matiz said. "The
course really becomes just for the student."
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
I was flipping my classes in an electronic classroom at Trinity University
before somebody coined the phrase "flipping the classroom." I forced students
to study technical content in my Camtasia videos before coming to class. In
class I made them show what they had learned from those videos. This is a great
way to help students learn technical content and to not put off learning until
examinations. The chronic complaint was that my courses demanded more time than
their other courses.
Bob Jensen's threads on flipping classrooms ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Ideas
Economic News and Writings
of Famous Economists
Economist’s View (Economic News
and Writings of Famous Economists) ---
http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/
Plagiarism in Legal
Documents
Google Search Examples
Example 1 from the University of Michigan ---
http://www.mgoblue.com/compliance/about.html
... the University will look at such factors as
whether the violation is intentional, whether any advantage is gained
(e.g., recruiting, competitive or for the student-athlete involved),
whether a student-athlete's eligibility is affected and whether
violations are recurring.
Example 2 from Syracuse University ---
http://supolicies.syr.edu/ethics/athletic_comply.htm
... the University will look at such factors as
whether the violation is intentional, whether any advantage is gained
(e.g., recruiting, competitive, or for the student-athlete involved),
whether a student-athlete's eligibility is affected, and whether
violations are recurring.
It does not take long to find similar instances in the wordings at different
universities for codes of ethics, faculty handbooks, student handbooks, medical
policies, athletics policies, etc. If I were assigned the task of writing my
university's documents in this regard of course I would examine the related
documents of other universities. Since this would be a legal document not
written in my name I might even be tempted to "cookie cut" phrases because of
the commonplace nature of "cookie cutter" phrases in legal documents.
My point is that it's commonplace to plagiarize in legal documents.
I think such "plagiarism" is extremely common in the law profession in general.
An illustration can be found in the "cookie cutter" lawsuits where only the
names and places are changed. Law firms extensively plagiarize to a point where
it is probably no longer considered unethical.
"The Most Generous Book in
the World: An Illustrated Celebration of the Little-Known Sidekicks Behind
Creative Geniuses," by Maria Popova, Brain Pickings, October 22, 2014
---
http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/10/22/who-what-when-rothman-book/
Kristian asked me to link to
his weather maps at
http://www.honoluluhi5.com/whow/weather/
This is my reply
Hi Kristian,
The 2013 link you refer to is a newsletter that I
do not revise ex post., However, I will add your link to the October
29 version of this news letter at the end of the month ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbitsDirectory.htm
One thing you avoided is the uncomfortableness of
high humidity. On most of my visits to Hawaii I really did not enjoy the
high humidity, nor did I enjoy it when I lived in Tallahassee, Florida and
San Antonio Texas.
However, where humidity is lowest is often where
temperatures become uncomfortably hot like in Arizona and Nevada. Thus you
need map that factors in humidity and temperatures.
There is no heaven on earth except in certain
seasons like our autumn season in northern New England. For me life would be
boring without marked changes in the seasons ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
"The Best Teaching Resources on the Web," by David Goobler,
Chronicle of Higher Education, October 22, 2014 ---
https://chroniclevitae.com/news/770-the-best-teaching-resources-on-the-web?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
. . .
Often my first stop when I'm looking for a new
idea for the classroom is
Faculty Focus. It
regularly publishes short articles with practical ideas for the college
instructor. It’s a great resource -- well-designed, organized by topic,
and searchable. It also boasts Maryellen Weimer and her
Teaching Professor blog,
an outgrowth of Weimer's much-loved newsletter of the same name.
Weimer's articles are little jewels of concision, distilling practical
advice from recent pedagogical research findings.
Another useful site is that of
the IDEA Center,
a nonprofit that you may know from its student feedback services. Over
the years, IDEA has amassed a trove of pedagogy research, from short
"Notes on Instruction" to longer, peer-reviewed "IDEA papers."
Take a look; there's plenty there.
Speaking of peer-reviewed papers, it's now
easier than ever to plug in to current pedagogy research. Alongside
traditional, research-heavy articles, many pedagogy journals also
feature shorter, more practical papers that offer easily usable ideas.
Here's a good list of top pedagogy journals.
I often find new classroom ideas by visiting
the web pages of campus teaching and learning centers. Many of those
websites have evolved into excellent collections of teaching tips, as
their sponsoring universities have become more attuned to faculty
development. Some of my favorites are the ones at
UT Austin,
Berkeley, and
BYU.
Closer to home, The Chronicle hosts a
wide variety of good resources for instructors looking for ideas. James
M. Lang has been writing a monthly column on teaching for years now, and
if you're reading this, I probably don't need to tell you how useful his
columns are. Although there doesn't seem to be a dedicated archive page
for Lang's columns, you can find links to his most recent columns by
clicking here and scrolling down to "On Course".
In addition, The Chronicle’s
ProfHacker blog, while it features
posts about far more than just teaching, has a roster of experienced and
personable academics
frequently write about classroom strategies.
The blog is a particularly good place to go to learn more about using
new technologies in the classroom.
Finally, a promising new resource has just been
launched right here at Vitae:
a straightforward and easy-to-use syllabi database.
It’s an obviously useful idea. Teachers have probably shared syllabi for
as long as there has been syllabi; this just facilitates that sharing
across great distances. I’m excited at the prospect of this database
growing and providing a library of well-made syllabi, ready to consult
the next time I’m putting together a new course. It will only be as good
as its contributions, however. The folks at Vitae have made it
very, very easy to upload a syllabus; I just put one up in about 60
seconds. Why not head over there now and share one of yours?
What web resources do you make use of for your
teaching? I’m always eager to learn of more—add your favorite sites to
the comments below.
- See more at: https://chroniclevitae.com/news/770-the-best-teaching-resources-on-the-web?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en#sthash.04UAyWZs.dpuf
Often my first stop when I'm looking for a new idea
for the classroom is
Faculty Focus. It
regularly publishes short articles with practical ideas for the college
instructor. It’s a great resource -- well-designed, organized by topic, and
searchable. It also boasts Maryellen Weimer and her
Teaching Professor blog,
an outgrowth of Weimer's much-loved newsletter of the
same name. Weimer's articles are little jewels of concision, distilling
practical advice from recent pedagogical research findings.
Another useful site is that of
the IDEA Center, a
nonprofit that you may know from its student feedback services. Over the
years, IDEA has amassed a trove of pedagogy research, from short "Notes on
Instruction" to longer, peer-reviewed "IDEA papers."
Take a look; there's plenty there.
Speaking of peer-reviewed papers, it's now easier than
ever to plug in to current pedagogy research. Alongside traditional,
research-heavy articles, many pedagogy journals also feature shorter, more
practical papers that offer easily usable ideas.
Here's a good list of top pedagogy journals.
I often find new classroom ideas by visiting the web
pages of campus teaching and learning centers. Many of those websites have
evolved into excellent collections of teaching tips, as their sponsoring
universities have become more attuned to faculty development. Some of my
favorites are the ones at
UT Austin,
Berkeley, and
BYU.
Closer to home, The Chronicle hosts a wide
variety of good resources for instructors looking for ideas. James M. Lang
has been writing a monthly column on teaching for years now, and if you're
reading this, I probably don't need to tell you how useful his columns are.
Although there doesn't seem to be a dedicated archive page for Lang's
columns, you can find links to his most recent columns by
clicking here and scrolling down to "On Course".
In addition, The Chronicle’s
ProfHacker blog,
while it features posts about far more than just teaching, has a roster of
experienced and personable academics
frequently write about classroom strategies.
The blog is a particularly good place to go to learn
more about using new technologies in the classroom.
Finally, a promising new resource has just been
launched right here at Vitae:
a straightforward and easy-to-use syllabi database.
It’s an obviously useful idea. Teachers have probably
shared syllabi for as long as there has been syllabi; this just facilitates
that sharing across great distances. I’m excited at the prospect of this
database growing and providing a library of well-made syllabi, ready to
consult the next time I’m putting together a new course. It will only be as
good as its contributions, however. The folks at Vitae have made it
very, very easy to upload a syllabus; I just put one up in about 60 seconds.
Why not head over there now and share one of yours?
What web resources do you make use of for your
teaching? I’m always eager to learn of more—add your favorite sites to the
comments below.
Bob Jensen's threads on Tricks and Tools of the Trade ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm
Evernote ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evernote
"Using Evernote in the Classroom," by Amy Cavender, Chronicle of
Higher Education, October 20, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/using-evernote-in-the-classroom/58347?cid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
"A Brief Word from an Evernote Convert," by Kathleen Fitzpatrick,
Chronicle of Higher Education, July 6, 2010 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/A-Brief-Word-from-an-Evernote/25291/?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
I take notes. A lot of notes. I take notes when I
read, when I'm in meetings, when I'm listening to lectures, when I'm
figuring out what I need to do any given day. In fact, if I ever tell you
that I'm going to do something, but you don't see me make myself a note
about it, don't believe me.
Notes are the key to remembering, for me. Or, more
precisely: the act of taking notes is the key to remembering. Something
about the act of taking notes helps make an idea, or an issue, or a plan
more real to me.
I used to take these notes longhand, in various
notebooks, some devoted to particular projects, some to more general
notetaking. Several years back, though, I began shifting my notetaking to
the computer, so that those notes would be more easily searchable and
repurposeable.
Originally, I used Word for this purpose, but after
one MS Office upgrade too many, requiring that all of my documents be
converted (and thus become unreadable to the older version of the software),
I decided that I wanted something more lightweight. The purpose of these
notes, after all, was the text that went into them, and not their
formatting; plain vanilla ".txt" files were likely to remain highly flexible
into the future.
But those .txt files started proliferating on my
machine, and so did the folders I used to organize them. And while Mac OS
X's search capabilities via Spotlight aren't all that bad now, that wasn't
always the case. So when I stumbled across
Steven Johnson's post about how he used DEVONthink,
I was sold.
DEVONthink is an extraordinarily powerful
information management system -- a bit too powerful, quite honestly, for
what I needed it to do. So back in May, when
Shawn Miller guest-posted here on ProfHacker
about how he uses
Evernote, I was
persuaded to give it a try.
One might begin to think I'm too easily swayed, but
honestly, I test out a lot of software that doesn't stick with me long. I've
been using Evernote for just shy of two months now, though, and I'm fairly
sure I'll be using it for a while. A few reasons why:
1. Automatic. I have Evernote
installed on my office desktop, my home desktop, my laptop, my iPad, and my
iPhone. And each of those instances automatically connects to the Evernote
server to keep my notes synchronized across all my devices. I've had one
incident in which I accidentally overwrote a more recent version of a note
by editing an old version before my iPhone had finished downloading the most
recent updates to my notebooks, but now I'm more cautious to be sure
everything has synchronized before I start typing in an existing note.
2. Web accessible. My notes are
also of course directly accessible from the Evernote server, should I not
have one of those five devices with me.
3. Lightweight. The Evernote
application itself has a very small footprint, using the teeniest amount of
memory and disk space. It's also quite nice in terms of response time. And
as most of my notes are just plain text, the database doesn't take up much
in the way of space.
4. Flexible. Of course, I don't
have to confine my notes to text with Evernote: I can easily
capture entire web pages with the Chrome (or other browser) extension, I can
import images and PDFs, and any number of other things I haven't even tried
yet. And, as Shawn pointed out, images are OCRable, so that the text within
them becomes searchable just like the rest of my notes.
5. Free. As I was just
experimenting with Evernote over the last two months, I haven't committed to
the paid version as yet. But the free version is thus far everything I need.
I've never come anywhere near using all of the monthly data allowance of the
free version, and the little ad in the corner of the application is
inoffensive. At some point, I'll probably upgrade to the paid version,
partially for a bit more flexibility in the kinds of files I can attach to
notes, and partially to support the team developing a really great project.
I do perhaps wish that my text files were really
stored as text files (Evernote saves them in its own proprietary
XML-based format, as well as in HTML format), but for what I'm doing, just
being able to find and copy the notes is enough. And overall I've had a
great experience with Evernote so far, which is allowing my notetaking habit
to become more productive and more organized than before.
"Skitch Finds New Life At Evernote With iPhone Version," by Jon
Mitchell, ReadWriteWeb, September 19, 2012 ---
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/skitch-finds-new-life-at-evernote-with-iphone-version.php
"6 Awesome Evernote Apps That We Guarantee You've Never Seen," by Jon
Mitchell, ReadWriteWeb, July 27, 2012 ---
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/evernote-announces-6-awesome-apps-as-2012-devcup-finalists.php
Bob Jensen's threads on Tricks and Tools of the Trade ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm
"Ending the Traditional MBA," by Kaitlin Mulhere, Inside Higher Ed,
October 23, 2014 ---
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/10/23/wake-forest-drop-traditional-mba-program
. . .
Starting next year, Wake Forest will no longer
accept applications for a traditional, daytime M.B.A. program at its
Winston-Salem campus. Instead, the university will expand its offerings for
working professionals.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
When I was at Trinity University the MBA program was increasingly becoming a
program for part time students, particularly military officers at the various
military bases in San Antonio.
Trinity, however, did not want any programs for part-time students such that
we scrapped the MBA program entirely. About the same time, Trinity dropped
over 20 other masters degree programs and required all undergraduate students in
the Education Department to enroll in a five-year program.
After the 150-hour rule to take the CPA exam commenced, we started a masters
of science program in accounting for full-time students. It continues to operate
for a small class of 15-25 students on average. This would not be cost effective
in most universities, but Trinity has such a huge endowment it maintains many
smaller programs for undergraduate and a few remaining graduate programs.
Virtual Reality ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_reality
Second Life ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life
Second Life Challenges and Criticisms ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Second_Life
Update on Second Life: Facial Expressions
"The Quest to Put More Reality in Virtual Reality," MIT's Technology
Review, October 22, 2014 --- Click
Here
http://www.technologyreview.com/featuredstory/531751/the-quest-to-put-more-reality-in-virtual-reality/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20141022
The inventor of Second Life has spent 15 years
chasing the dream of living in virtual space. Can his new company finally
give virtual worlds mass-market appeal?
Philip Rosedale is telling me about his new
company, but I can’t stop myself from looking down at my hands. With palms
up, I watch with fascination as I slowly wiggle my fingers and form the “OK”
sign. I curl my hands into fists as I reach my arms out in front. They look
pinker than normal but work as usual. When I look back up at Rosedale, he’s
wearing a smile, and his eyebrows rise slightly. “Isn’t it cool?” he says.
In my right ear, I hear a quiet chuckle from one of his colleagues, Ryan
Karpf, standing just outside my vision.
It is cool, because nothing that I’m seeing is
real. Though our conversation appears to be happening in a tastefully lit
club, I am actually sitting in front of a laptop in a San Francisco office
wearing a virtual-reality headset and headphones. I’m trying out a new
platform for virtual worlds in development by Rosedale’s startup, High
Fidelity.
When I put on the virtual-reality goggles, I saw
the view from my avatar’s eyes; as I moved my head, motion sensors in the
goggles controlled the movements of the avatar’s head. Moving my hands in
the real world controlled the avatar’s hands, thanks to an infrared motion
sensor mounted on the front of the headset.
I could gesture for emphasis, and look from person
to person as the conversation flowed or my attention drifted. More
important, I could get a read on what Rosedale and Karpf were thinking as
they spoke or listened—because their head movements and facial expressions
mirrored what their real bodies were doing. Each had logged in from a laptop
with a small 3-D camera perched on its screen; the camera captured their
expressions, down to eye blinks and lip movements. Their virtual mouths
synched with their real words. After the initial unfamiliarity wore off,
chatting with Rosedale and Karpf in virtual space was much the same as it
would have been in real space.
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's threads on Second Life with special emphasis on applications
in accounting courses ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#SecondLife
Book Reviews
Intertwingled: Information Changes Everything ---
http://lisnews.org/intertwingled_information_changes_everything
From LISnews on October 21, 2014
In the new book and PBS series “How We Got to Now,” Steven Johnson
presents six game-changing innovations and how they shaped the modern world.
Hari Sreenivasan talks to Johnson about surprising connections between
invention and American society.
UNC's 20-Year Academic Scandals Were Not Confined to Athletics and African
and Afro-American Studies Departments
Where were the internal controls on grade change forms?
"Widespread Nature of Chapel Hill's Academic Fraud Is Laid Bare," by Jack
Stripling, Chronicle of Higher Education, October 23, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Widespread-Nature-of-Chapel/149603/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Jensen Comment
My accounting background makes me think first about internal control. UNC
apparently had no internal control over grade changes. For example, when I
taught at Trinity University a grade change form had four carbon copies that I
submitted to the registrars office. When the student's grade was changed one of
those copies I signed was returned to me.
At UNC the Afro-American Studies Department left grade change forms where
students could get blank copies and forge instructor signatures for virtually
any courses on campus. Apparently a copy of a grade change form was not sent
back to an instructor who would then realize that somebody had forged his or her
signature. UNC gets an F on internal control, and nobody should change that
grade!
Yeah Right! Wink! Wink!
What is unbelievable is that UNC said this went on for 20 years without coaches,
higher administrative officials, and 99.9% of the faculty being aware that
thousands of students were cheating, only about half of them being athletes.
"UNC investigation: Bogus classes were pushed by academic counselors,"
by Dan Kane and Jane Stancill, newsobserver.com, October 22, 2014,
http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/10/22/4255098_unc-investigation-bogus-classes.html?rh=
"New Report Implicates UNC's Athletics Department In Fake Classes Scandal,"
by Peter Jacobs, Business Insider, October 22, 2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/new-report-implicates-uncs-athletics-department-in-fake-classes-scandal-2014-10
The University of North Carolina Chapel Hill
athletics department knew about and encouraged fake classes and grade
manipulation for the school's athletes, according to a new report released
Wednesday.
A previous report released in 2012
revealed a long history at UNC of classes in the Department of Afro and
African-American Studies that never met, as well
as a culture of changing and improving grades. These classes were heavily
populated by student athletes.
The 2012 report cleared the UNC athletics
department of any involvement in the athletes' grade inflation.
This no longer seems to be the case. According to
The News & Observer, Wednesday's report "found
a new culprit: the Academic Support Program for Student-Athletes ... The
report describes a fairly broad group of academic and athletic officials who
knew about athletes getting better grades in classes that only required
papers, yet taking little or no action."
Additionally,
student newspaper The Daily Tar Heel reports, the
new report "found clear evidence that academic counselors from the football,
men's basketball and women's basketball teams asked for players to be
enrolled in bogus independent study classes in order for them to be
eligible."
The more recent investigation was led by Kenneth
Wainstein, a former U.S. Justice Department official. Wainstein reportedly
had an unprecedented level of access to material related to the UNC scandal,
as well as the cooperation of former African studies chairman Julius
Nyang'oro and department administrator Deborah Crowder.
"UNC's Fake 'Paper Classes' Were Not Just For Athletes — They Were Also
Very Popular With Frat Boys," by Peter Jacobs, Business Insider, October 23,
2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/uncs-fake-paper-classes-were-also-popular-with-frat-boys-2014-10
Jensen Comment
It's possible to estimate the number of students who took fake classes (the
media is reporting 3,100 students over 20 years) at the University of North
Carolina. But we will probably never know the number of students who forged
grade change slips for legitimate courses.
"University of North Carolina learning specialist receives death threats
after her research finds one in 10 college athletes have reading age of a THIRD
GRADER," by Sara Malm, Daily Mail, January 10, 2014 ---
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2537041/University-North-Carolina-learning-specialist-receives-death-threats-research-finds-one-10-college-athletes-reading-age-fifth-grader.html
Mary Willingham exposed college athletes' lack of
academic abilities
- She found that 10 per cent read at elementary
school level
- A majority of players' reading level was
between 4th and 8th grade
- Men's basketball makes $16.9m-a-year for
University of North Carolina
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
More often than not employers make it uncomfortable for whistleblowers who don't
resign. UNC does not deny that for ten years varsity athletes took fake courses
and were "allowed" to change their grades. They just contend that these athletes
did not suffer academically because they were in the wonderful learning
environment of the University of North Carolina. Yeah Right!
UNC Fudging the Grades of Athletes
"Scandal Bowl: Why Tar Heel Fraud Might Be Just the Start," by Paul M.
Barrett, Bloomberg Businessweek, January 6, 2014 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-01-06/unc-athletic-scandal-charges-of-fraud-could-be-tip-of-wider-revelations?campaign_id=DN010614
The corruption of
academics at the University of North Carolina’s Chapel Hill campus could
turn into the most revelatory of all of the undergraduate sports scandals in
recent memory. Beginning three years ago with what sounded like
garden-variety reports of under-the-table payments from agents and improper
classroom help for athletes, the affair has spread and deepened to include
evidence of hundreds of sham courses offered since the early 1990s. Untold
numbers of grades have been changed without authorization and faculty
signatures forged—all in the service of an elaborate campaign to keep elite
basketball and football players academically eligible to play.
After belatedly catching up with the UNC debacle in
this recent dispatch,
I’ve decided the still-developing story deserves wider
attention. Or, to put it more precisely, the
excellent reporting already done by the News &
Observer of Raleigh merits amplification outside of North Carolina.
The rot in Chapel Hill
undermines UNC’s reputation as one of the nation’s finest public
institutions of higher learning. Officials created classes that did not
meet. That’s not the only reason more scrutiny is needed. There’s also the
particularly pernicious way that the school’s African and Afro-American
Studies Department has been used to inflate the GPAs of basketball and
football players. The corruption of a scholarly discipline devoted to black
history and culture underscores a racial subtext to the exploitation of
college athletes that typically goes unidentified in polite discussion.
(UNC’s former longtime Afro-Am chairman, Julius Nyang’oro, has been
criminally indicted for fraud.)
Another reason Chapel Hill
requires sustained investigation is the manner in which the athletic and
academic hierarchies at UNC, along with the National Collegiate Athletic
Association, have so far whitewashed the scandal. Officials have repeatedly
denied that the fiasco’s roots trace to an illicit agenda that, in the name
of coddling a disproportionately black undergraduate athlete population, has
left many students intellectually crippled.
Dan Kane, the News & Observer‘s lead
investigative reporter, does old-school, just-the-facts-m’am work—and more
power to him. Digging up the basic data has been a lonely and arduous task
for which Kane has been rewarded with craven accusations of home state
disloyalty. As he wrote
last month, the six official “reviews” and
“investigations” of the wayward Afro-Am Department have all failed to
connect the dots in any meaningful way. In coming weeks and months, I hope I
can supplement Kane’s dogged efforts with some long-distance perspective.
Valuable tips from concerned local people, some of them UNC alumni, are
already pouring in, and that’s part of the reason I’m going to pursue the
story. Keep those e-mails coming.
One source of insight is Jay
Smith, a professor of early modern French history at UNC. A serious scholar
who understands the university’s sports-happy culture, Smith has developed a
powerful distaste for the way his employer has obfuscated the scandal.
“What’s going on here is so important,” he told me by telephone, “because
it’s emblematic of what I think goes on at major universities all across the
country,” where the business of sports undermines the mission of education.
That sounds right to me.
Smith has the best sort of
self-interested motivation for making sense of what has happened on his
campus: He’s writing a book about the whole mess, based in part on
statistics and personal experiences proffered by UNC instructors assigned
over the years to assist varsity athletes. To me that sounds like a
page-turner—and even the basis of an HBO movie.
I asked Smith what he thinks
is going to happen next. He pointed to comments that the local district
attorney made when the disgraced former Afro-Am chairman, Nyang’oro, was
indicted in December. Orange County DA Jim Woodall told the News &
Observer that a second person is also under investigation and could be
indicted soon. Woodall did not identify the second target, except to say the
person is not someone who currently works for UNC. ”Other probes have
identified Nyang’oro’s longtime department manager, Deborah Crowder, as
being involved in the bogus classes,” the News & Observer noted.
“She retired in 2009.” Both Crowder and Nyang’oro have refused to comment
publicly, and Nyang’oro’s criminal defense lawyer didn’t return my e-mail
inquiry.
The indictment of Crowder, a
relatively low-level administrative figure, could crack open the case. It
defies logic that Nyang’oro and his assistant would have operated a rogue
department without the knowledge of more senior faculty members, if not top
university administrators. It further defies reason that this pair would
have created phony classes for athletes without the urging and participation
of people in the UNC athletic bureaucracy. Nyang’oro and Crowder are going
to have ample reason to sing as part of potential plea deals.
Even before that
happens, according to Smith, one or more well-positioned whistle-blowers are
likely to go public and start naming names if they think the powers that be
are planning to isolate Crowder and Nyang’oro as the sole villains. This
thing goes much higher, and there’s much more to come from Chapel Hill.
"Alleged Academic Fraud at U. of North Carolina Tests NCAA's Reach: Myths
surrounding the group's investigation cloud the controversy at Chapel Hill,"
by Brad Wolverton, Chronicle of Higher Education, September 7, 2012 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Alleged-Academic-Fraud-at-U/134270/
"North Carolina
Admits to Academic Fraud in Sports Program," Inside Higher Ed,
September 20, 2011 ---
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/09/20/qt#270772
Bob Jensen's threads on professors who let students cheat ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Plagiarism.htm#RebeccaHoward
The best thing UNC can do at this point is to move from NCAA Division 1 to
Division 3. Then they can compete with the University of Chicago on everything.
"3 Questions Left Unanswered by Chapel Hill’s Academic-Fraud Report,"
Chronicle of Higher Education, October 23, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/3-questions-left-unanswered-by-chapel-hills-academic-fraud-report/88381?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Jensen Comment
Except for the wink-wink question about higher administrators and faculty, there
are more important questions to be answered in this 20-year UNC mess.
For me the biggest question concerns what is ethical and what is not ethical
when you're dealing with unmotivated students who you want to help in
literally every way? When do you as a faculty member and/or administrator
cross the line? Did the UNC head of the Parr Center for
Ethics ant UNC cross the line if faking it for some unmotivated students put
them back on track?
The Cozy Relationships of Academic Counselors to Athletes: I'm
Surprised More of Them Don't Get Married
"On the Line," by Jack Stripling, Chronicle of Higher Education,
October 24, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/On-the-Line/149613/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Some of Them Do Get Married
Linebacker's Wife Says She Wrote His Papers (and took two online courses for
him)
The wife of a star University of South Florida
linebacker says she wrote his academic papers and took two online classes for
him. The accusations against Ben Moffitt, who had been promoted by the
university to the news media as a family man, were made in e-mail messages to
The Tampa Tribune, and followed Mr. Moffitt’s filing for divorce. Mr. Moffitt
called the accusations “hearsay,” and a university spokesman said the matter was
a “domestic issue.” If it is found that Mr. Moffitt committed academic fraud,
the newspaper reported, the university could be subject to an NCAA
investigation.
"Linebacker's Wife Says She Wrote His Papers," Chronicle of Higher Education
News Blog, January 5, 2008 ---
http://chronicle.com/news/article/3707/linebackers-wife-says-she-wrote-his-papers?at
She directed the university’s Parr Center for Ethics
(at the University of North Carolina)
"The Ethicist (philosophy professor and academic counselor) Who Crossed the
Line," by Brad Wolverton, Chronicle of Higher Education, October 24,
2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/The-Ethicist-Who-Crossed-the/149619/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
. . .
But the person everyone’s talking about is Ms.
Boxill, a senior philosophy lecturer and former academic counselor for
athletes. According to an independent report released on Wednesday, she
played a key role in steering athletes into fake classes to help them
maintain their eligibility with the National Collegiate Athletic
Association.
While many people were implicated in the breakdown,
which involved more than 3,000 students over 18 years, Ms. Boxill was unique
because of her background: Although she did not have tenure, she was a
faculty leader, administrator, and athletics insider, lending her a
credibility that few people on campus enjoyed. That status made her
precipitous fall all the more puzzling. (A university spokesperson would not
comment on her employment, but on Wednesday the university said that nine
employees were being terminated or were under disciplinary review.)
Her reputation as an honest broker—she directed
the university’s Parr Center for Ethics—made
her an unlikely villain. Several colleagues describe her as someone who
often set aside her own needs for people who had little to give in return.
She took orders from chancellors, but she still talked to the
groundskeepers.
Continued in article
Another question is how far do you go to save a fraternity partying
student who is not an athlete?
"UNC's Fake 'Paper Classes' Were Not Just For Athletes — They Were Also
Very Popular With Frat Boys," by Peter Jacobs, Business Insider, October 23,
2014 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/uncs-fake-paper-classes-were-also-popular-with-frat-boys-2014-10
Jensen Comment
It's possible to estimate the number of students who took fake classes (the
media is reporting 3,100 students over 20 years) at the University of North
Carolina. But we will probably never know the number of students who forged
grade change slips for legitimate courses.
Bob Jensen's threads on professors who let students cheat ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Plagiarism.htm#RebeccaHoward
Don’t let anybody tell you that raising the minimum
wage will kill jobs, they always say that.
Hillary Clinton
Even Paul Krugman admits that robots are replacing lower-skilled as well as
higher-skilled workers. McDonalds is now experimenting with automated order
taking that will eventually replace many of its lowest-paid workers. In fairness
to Ms. Clinton, it may not be so much the wages that are driving the robotics as
the expensive worker benefits and sometimes the human training and turnover
costs. Versatile robots are now being invented that are more easily trained for
different types of work.
"Rise of the Robots," by Paul
Krugman, The New York Times, December 8, 2012 ---
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/08/rise-of-the-robots/
Manufacturers Adding Robots to Factory Floors in Record Numbers ---
http://www.technologyreview.com/graphiti/529971/robots-rising/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20140818
"All Around The World, Labor Is Losing Out To
Capital," The Economist, November 3, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/all-around-the-world-labor-is-losing-out-to-capital-2013-11
Graphic from the New York Times
via Barry Ritholtz: Change in private manufacturing jobs, by county in the USA
This graphic shows why there is such a lousy future in manufacturing jobs. There
are many causes, especially the slow economic recovery and reduced government
spending for such things as military equipment, but the increasing
displacements are causes by robotics and automation that increasingly replace
manufacturing workers in ways that were not imagined 20 ago. Will the last
person leaving an automated factory turn out the lithts ---
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2014/06/change-in-private-manufacturing-jobs-by-county/
"Everywhere I Look I See Jobs
That Will Be Replaced By Robots," by Richard White, Business Insider,
September 12, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/everywhere-i-go-i-see-jobs-that-will-be-replaced-by-robots-2013-9
No More Jobs on the Farms or Most Anywhere Else
"Get Ready for Robot Farmers," by Jodi Helmer, CNNMoney
via Yahoo Tech, October 24, 2014 ---
https://www.yahoo.com/tech/get-ready-for-robot-farmers-100613764059.html
"Patented Book Writing System Creates, Sells Hundreds Of Thousands Of
Books On Amazon," by David J. Hull, Security Hub, December 13, 2012
---
http://singularityhub.com/2012/12/13/patented-book-writing-system-lets-one-professor-create-hundreds-of-thousands-of-amazon-books-and-counting/
Philip M. Parker, Professor of Marketing at INSEAD Business School,
has had a side project for over 10 years. He’s created
a computer system that can write books about specific subjects in about 20
minutes. The patented algorithm has so far generated hundreds of thousands
of books. In fact, Amazon lists over 100,000 books attributed to Parker, and
over 700,000 works listed for his company,
ICON Group International, Inc. This doesn’t
include the private works, such as internal reports,
created for companies or licensing of the system itself through a separate
entity called
EdgeMaven Media.
Parker is not so much an author as a compiler, but
the end result is the same: boatloads of written works.
"Raytheon's Missiles Are Now Made by Robots," by Ashlee Vance,
Bloomberg Business Week, December 11, 2012 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-12-11/raytheons-missiles-now-made-by-robots
A World Without Work," by Dana Rousmaniere, Harvard Business Review
Blog, January 27, 2013 ---
Click Here
http://blogs.hbr.org/morning-advantage/2013/01/morning-advantage-a-world-with.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date
Jensen Comment
There's hope until robots are reading, comprehending, and writing reviews of
books written by robots.
Jensen Question
How many years will it take for cost accountants to stop teaching how to
allocate overhead on the basis of direct labor hours or costs?
Question
What's the difference between farmers and lawyers?
Answer
Farmers are being replaced by robots
"Get Ready for Robot Farmers," by Jodi Helmer, CNNMoney via
Yahoo Tech, October 24, 2014 ---
https://www.yahoo.com/tech/get-ready-for-robot-farmers-100613764059.html
Lawyers don't need to be replaced
"Law School Carnage Enters Its Fifth Year," by Paul Caron, TaxProf
Blog, October 24, 2014 ---
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2014/10/law-school-carnage-.html
Lynda Barry, Cartoonist Turned Professor, Gives Her Old Fashioned Take on
the Future of Education ---
Click Here
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/-G8UbZDAj1U/lynda-barry-on-the-future-of-education.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Bob Jensen's threads on the future of higher education ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm
Tertiary education ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tertiary_education
Tertiary education, also referred to as third stage, third
level, and post-secondary education, is the educational level
following the completion of a school providing a
secondary education. The
World
Bank, for example, defines tertiary education as including universities
as well as institutions that teach specific capacities of higher learning
such as colleges, technical training institutes, community colleges, nursing
schools, research laboratories, centers of excellence, and distance learning
centers.[1]
Higher education is taken to include
undergraduate and
postgraduate education, while
vocational education and training beyond secondary education is known as
further education in the
United Kingdom, or
continuing education in the
United States.
Tertiary education generally culminates in the receipt of
certificates,
diplomas,
or
academic degrees.
Education by Country ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_education_articles_by_country
Education in Germany ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Germany
The Most Educated Countries in the World (in terms of "tertiary education")
---
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/the-most-educated-countries-in-the-world.html?page=all
- Canada
- Israel
- Japan
- United States
- New Zealand
- South Korea
- United Kingdom
- Finland
- Australia
- Ireland
Countries with the highest proportions of college graduates ---
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/22/countries-with-the-most-c_n_655393.html#s117378&title=Russian_Federation_54
- Russian Federation 54.0% (quality varies due to rampant cheating and
corruption where students can buy course grades and admission)
- Canada 48.3%
- Israel 43.6%
- Japan 41.0%
- New Zealand 41.0%
- United States 40.3% (colleges vary greatly in terms of admissions
standards and rigor for graduation)
- Finland 36.4%
- South Korea 34.3%
- Norway 34.2%
- Australia 33.7%
Germany is still under the OECD average in terms of proportions of college
graduates at 23.9% ---
http://andrewhammel.typepad.com/german_joys/2010/09/education-governments-should-expand-tertiary-studies-to-boost-jobs-and-tax-revenues.html
.
Jensen Comment
This tidbit was inspired by reference to the fact that tertiary education in
Germany was free and is now returning to virtually free. Note, however, that
getting into college in Germany is extremely competitive based mostly upon
examinations along the way in what we call K-12 schools ---
http://www.german-way.com/history-and-culture/education/
Note there's a huge difference between free tuition and free college
education covering tuition, room, board, transportation, computers, books, etc.
It's much more likely in the USA that students can both live at home and get
college degrees due to higher numbers of nearby college campuses all across the
USA and the increasing prevalence online college degree opportunities relative
to all of Europe, especially in Germany. Germans may get free tuition, but they
may have to leave home and pay for their own relatively expensive room and board
in large cities.
Germany has a smaller proportion of college graduates in large measure due
somewhat to both the status and the wages of people that elect to go into the
skilled trades rather than college where salaries may often be lower.
But the primary reason is the limited space in German universities and the
competitiveness of the qualifying examinations to get in. Unlike the USA, first
year German college students are good in reading, writing, and college-level
mathematics. In the USA colleges increasingly are faced with students needing
to have remedial courses in reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Germany is still under the OECD average in terms of proportions of college
graduates at 23.9% ---
http://andrewhammel.typepad.com/german_joys/2010/09/education-governments-should-expand-tertiary-studies-to-boost-jobs-and-tax-revenues.html
.
The study's setting off the
usual alarm bells (g) in Germany. I
speculated on the cause of Germany's low
college-graduation rates a while ago, but I think one factor I forgot to
mention is cost. It's not that some German universities have introduced
tuition fees -- in international comparison, these tuition fees are
negligible. The problem is rather that Germany has a woefully inadequate
system for financing higher education. Germany does have a loan/grant scheme
for students (called Bafoeg), but it's
extremely complex and miserly (g). Not that I'm a
big fan of student loans, but a well-regulated system of affordable student
loans is much better than Germany's current system of measly scholarships,
half-time university posts, and help from relatives.
Even if simple, affordable loans were available, the
problem would remained that lots of young Germans are reluctant to face what
students in most other countries have long accepted: college costs money,
and that means debt. I'm consistently surprised to meet Germans who could
have gone to college but didn't, and instead decided to become hairdressers,
chimney sweeps, butchers, or machinists. There are ads all over my
university right now which advise university students who "don't like
studying" to drop out of college and train to become air-traffic
controllers.
The rationale behind people who choose these
professions is that "we'll always need" people to do these jobs, so they
offer steadier employment. I'm not so sure. In fact, something tells me that
15 years from now or so, we're going to need a
whole lot fewer human air-traffic controllers than
we do now...
In comparison say in the USA and Australia, the skilled trades may pay better
in many instances but the social status of college graduates is generally higher
relative to the status of skilled trades workers in Germany. Also in the USA
college graduates are less bounded due to the American Dream of reaching almost
unheard of salaries as physicians, veterinarians, corporate executives, etc.
relative to counterparts in Germany where white collar salaries are more bounded
by taxes and culture relative to living expenses (that are generally higher,
especially for big houses luxury condos, and acreages).
There is an increasing and long-delayed initiative to open up the German
education system to be more like the North American dreams.
Berlin's Gymnasium Lottery
In 2009 the Berlin Senate decided that Berlin's gymnasium schools should no
longer be allowed to pick all of their students. It was ruled that while
they would be able to pick 70% to 65% of their students, the other places
were to be allocated by lottery. Every child is able to enter the lottery,
no matter how he or she performed in primary school. It is hoped that this
policy will increase the number of working class students attending a
gymnasium. The Left proposed that Berlin gymnasiums should no longer be
allowed to expel students who perform poorly, so that students who won a
gymnasium place in the lottery have a higher chance of graduating from that
school. It is not clear yet whether Berlin's senate will decide in favor of
The Left's proposal.
Bob Jensen's threads on the future of higher education ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm
Recall that Bill Sharpe of CAPM fame and controversy is a Nobel Laureate ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Forsyth_Sharpe
Sharpe Ratio ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharpe_ratio
"Don’t Over-Rely on Historical Data to Forecast Future Returns," by
Charles Rotblut and William Sharpe, AAII Journal, October 2014 ---
http://www.aaii.com/journal/article/dont-over-rely-on-historical-data-to-forecast-future-returns?adv=yes
Jensen Comment
The same applies to not over-relying on historical data in valuation. My
favorite case study that I used for this in teaching is the following:
Questrom vs. Federated Department Stores,
Inc.: A Question of Equity Value," by University of Alabama faculty members
by Gary Taylor, William Sampson, and Benton Gup, May 2001 edition of
Issues in Accounting Education ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/roi.htm
Jensen Comment
I want to especially thank
David Stout, Editor of the May 2001
edition of Issues in Accounting Education. There has been something
special in all the editions edited by David, but the May edition is very
special to me. All the articles in that edition are helpful, but I want to
call attention to three articles that I will use intently in my graduate
Accounting Theory course.
- "Questrom vs. Federated
Department Stores, Inc.: A Question of Equity Value," by University of
Alabama faculty members Gary Taylor, William Sampson, and Benton Gup,
pp. 223-256.
This is perhaps the best short case that I've ever read. It will
undoubtedly help my students better understand weighted average cost of
capital, free cash flow valuation, and the residual income model. The
three student handouts are outstanding. Bravo to Taylor, Sampson, and
Gup.
- "Using the Residual-Income
Stock Price Valuation Model to Teach and Learn Ratio Analysis," by
Robert Halsey, pp. 257-276.
What a follow-up case to the Questrom case mentioned above! I have long
used the Dupont Formula in courses and nearly always use the excellent
paper entitled "Disaggregating the ROE: A
New Approach," by T.I. Selling and C.P. Stickney,
Accounting Horizons, December 1990, pp. 9-17. Halsey's paper guides
students through the swamp of stock price valuation using the residual
income model (which by the way is one of the few academic accounting
models that has had a major impact on accounting practice, especially
consulting practice in equity valuation by CPA firms).
- "Developing Risk Skills: An
Investigation of Business Risks and Controls at Prudential Insurance
Company of America," by Paul Walker, Bill Shenkir, and Stephen Hunn,
pp. 291
I will use this case to vividly illustrate the "tone-at-the-top"
importance of business ethics and risk analysis. This is case is easy
to read and highly informative.
Bob Jensen's threads on accounting theory ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Theory01.htm
From LISnews on October 21, 2014
October 20, 2014 - 5:07pm — Bibliofuture
NYT Bits Blog
Excerpt: Compared with previous Kindles, text on the Kindle Voyage
appears both sharper and in starker relief against the background.
Graphics, like charts and graphs, look just as clear as they do in any
black-and-white book.
The effect is beguiling. If you look at the new
Kindle for any stretch of time, you don’t just forget that you’re
reading an e-book; you forget that you’re using any kind of electronic
device at all.
Amazon says the Voyage offers a better
approximation of print than has ever been available on an e-reader, but
for me, it’s far better than that. It offers the visual clarity of
printed text with the flexibility of an electronic device.
Following in the Footsteps of the University of Wisconsin
"U. of Michigan Gets Accreditor Approval for Competency-Based Degree,"
Chronicle of Higher Education, October 21, 2014 ---
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2014/10/21/u-michigan-gets-accreditor-approval-competency-based-degree
Jensen Comment
To date there are only selected degrees and courses available in
competency-based programs. For example, the start up Michigan program will
only apply to a masters degree using medical school-administered competency
examinations. The broadest-based program to date is available at the University
of Southern New Hampshire. In the 1800s students could take final examinations
at the University of Chicago without attending classes.
Bob Jensen's threads on degrees and course credits without courses ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Assess.htm#ConceptKnowledge
Web Publishing Pleasures Versus Journal Publishing Agonies
Jensen Comment
I recall being at a conference where Baruch Lev made a comment that he was not
looking forward to a summer of doing battle with journal referees. Personally, I
no longer want to do battles with referees and post my essays at my Website and
a listserv called AECM --- letting the chips fall as they may. I almost always
publish replies from readers at my Website, with their permission. That is about
the only type of refereeing that my writings encounter these days. My debates on
the listserv are more rewarding to me that all my years of trying to accommodate
journal referees.
Since journals like the American Accounting Association journals are not
available to Web crawlers like Google and Yahoo, I get far more feedback from my
Web publishing than I ever did from my journal publishing, feedback from global
strangers who do not subscribe to AAA journals. In most respects I feel that I
have far more people around the world reading my Web articles than people who
read my formal journal articles.
There is a natural science journal called eLIFE that tries to strike a
balance between the perfectionism demands of referees and the publishing of
non-refereed working papers.
eLIFE (a natural sciences research journal that avoids endless cycles of
revisions) ---
http://elifesciences.org
Initial decisions are made in a few days,
post-review decisions in about a month, and most articles go through only
one round of revision. Every author also has the option to make their
accepted manuscript openly available shortly after receiving a final
decision
However, I don't think eLIFE articles, like most journal articles, can
be found by Web crawlers. That is sad. This suggests that authors should do
pre-publication of working papers on their Web servers or in pre-publication
outlets like SSRN and bioRxiv.org that are crawled over daily by the Web search
engines.
Of course authors who need journal articles for reputation building,
promotion, and tenure in the Academy I do not recommend avoiding the agonies of
battles with referees in journal article publishing. However, once they hit a
certain point in their careers where they want more pleasure than pain from
their writing endeavors, I highly recommend Web and listserv publishing,
including blog publishing. I have three blogs that give me pleasure.
For lack of a better term, final acceptance by journal referees put a
"finality" seal to submissions in a journal like TAR that does not publish
comments and rejoinders. Any updates and revisions must essentially be new
submissions that must once again run the gauntlet of the refereeing process ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm
I love Web, blog, and listserv publishing because there is no such
"finality." These articles are living documents that can be updated and revised
in real time to a point where readers really should hit the refresh button of
their browsers when they go to a Web site.
Bob Jensen's 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
Bob Jensen's Threads (more like
scrapbooks) ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm
"The Best Infographics of the Year: Nate Silver on the 3 Keys to Great
Information Design and the Line Between Editing and Censorship," by Maria
Popova, Brain Pickings, October 14, 2014 ---
http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/10/14/best-american-infographics-2014-nate-silver/
Bob Jensen's threads on
Visualization of Multivariate Data (including faces) ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/352wpvisual/000datavisualization.htm
AICPA Launches New Tools to Assist CPA Firms in Expanding and Enhancing
Diversity and Inclusion Efforts ---
http://www.aicpa.org/press/pressreleases/2014/pages/new-tools-cpa-firms-accounting-diversity.aspx
AICPA Foundation Awards $277,500 to 92 Minority Accounting Scholars
(in undergraduate and graduate programs)---
http://www.aicpa.org/press/pressreleases/2014/pages/aicpa-foundation-awards-minority-accounting-scholarships.aspx
. . .
As Minority Scholarship recipients, the 92 students
enter the AICPA
Legacy Scholars program, established in 2011. The
Program awards recipients a one-year AICPA Legacy Scholarship and helps them
develop the soft skills needed to maintain a successful career through
service. Scholarship recipients plan, promote and execute an eight-hour
community service project each semester. The service activity must relate to
accounting, serve the community and be meaningful to the student.
AICPA Legacy Scholars are Student Affiliate Members
of the AICPA, which is a free membership option available to all currently
enrolled students. Each AICPA Legacy Scholar is assigned a coach to provide
guidance on the student’s service project and to advise on questions related
to the profession and the work environment.
Scholarship funding is provided by the AICPA
Foundation, with contributions from the Accounting Education Foundation of
the Texas Society of CPAs ($10,000), the New Jersey Society of CPAs ($5,000)
and Robert Half International ($5,500). The majority of students receive
individual awards of $3,000 to fund expenses related to their pursuit of an
accounting degree.
Continued in article (including a listing of the students receiving
awards this year and their universities)
Jensen Comment
Minority students interested in doctoral studies in accountancy are encouraged
to apply to the KPMG Foundation that (with funding support from various
accounting and business firms) to provide full-ride financial support to various
accountancy Ph.D. programs. Other support is also available.
http://www.kpmg.com/ca/en/topics/the-kpmg-foundation/education-grants/pages/home.aspx
Bob Jensen's threads on careers ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#careers
"SELLING THE NEED FOR WORK," by Joe Hoyle, Teaching Blog, October 13,
2014 ---
http://joehoyle-teaching.blogspot.com/2014/10/selling-need-for-work.html
In my previous blog posting, I talked about
motivation – are you a football coach or a scout leader? I received several
emails asking how I motivate students under either of those approaches.
Well, no motivational style works perfectly on every occasion but I think
you need to (a) really communicate clearly to your students at all times and
(b) sell the course to them. Every course and every friend and every club is
demanding every minute of a student’s time. Why should they pick your course
to focus their attentions? I think that is where communication becomes vital
and I think that communication has to have some element of marketing in it.
If you believe in the importance of your course, then you need to help them
understand what needs to be done.
Consequently, here is an email that I sent to my
students today.
To: Accounting Students
From: JH
At the beginning of the semester, I made the
comment that a successful class is like a dance that is well done. If I do
half of the work and you do half of the work, then we can accomplish great
things. But if either of us does less than half of the work, then the dance
is never going to go very well no matter how much the other party is
working.
You have every right to assess whether I (or any
other teacher) is doing half of the work. If not, you should complain.
And, in the same manner, I periodically assess how
you are doing. We are on fall break. It is a good time for an assessment.
Our second test is in just a few days. I know how you did on the first test.
I’m really interested now in where you are heading on our second test.
My guess is that you view this class as a
class—maybe a little more important or a little less important than others,
but really nothing different than a class.
I view this class as an opportunity. It is one
where you can add some knowledge to your brain that might prove helpful one
day. It is an opportunity that might make you a bit sharper at some time in
the future, more astute, a better decision-maker, a wiser and more
successful person.
So, over the last couple of days, I have gone over
the seating chart, person by person assessing whether you are making good
use of this opportunity. Are you doing your half of the dance? Truthfully,
as a whole, I am pretty well pleased. No group is perfect but a number of
you are clearly doing your half. In general, I have few complaints.
Unfortunately, we live in a specific world and not in a general world.
Here’s how I kind of assess students when I am
thinking about each one of you.
Continued in article
Jensen Comment
Joe is relatively stingy with top grades. This is one of the main motivators for
hard work by students in class.
"Australian Premier Calls University’s Fossil-Fuel Divestment ‘Stupid’,"
by Andy Thomason, Chronicle of Higher Education, October 16, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/jp/prime-minister-australian-colleges-divestment-from-fossil-fuels-is-stupid?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Jensen Comment
Universities who divest from fossil fuel investments in their portfolios and/or
shift from fossil fuel use for heating and cooling on campus generally do so as
a symbolic publicity gesture rather than good economics. For example, coal
companies in many instances are seeking capital to make abundant coal more
environmentally friendly. Depriving them of capital may may make them play
dirtier in production and politics.
Also there are supply chain considerations. If coal is the cheapest form of
energy then electric companies have more operating cash to invest in carbon
removal.
One of the most worrisome happenings in the world is the global destruction
of our great oxygen sources --- the rain forests. We should make it a priority
to build machines that can act like trees that feed carbon in and push oxygen
out. Those machines are not yet replacing rain forests, but I long for the day
when they will supply earth with abundant oxygen.
"In a First, Commercial Coal Plant Buries Its CO2: A coal plant in
Saskatchewan will capture most of its carbon pollution—and use it to extract oil
from the ground," by David Talbot, MIT's Technology Review, October
3, 2014 ---
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/531321/in-a-first-commercial-coal-plant-buries-its-co2/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20141003
A coal plant that opened today in Saskatchewan
captures and buries the carbon dioxide it emits—with two significant
caveats: it still emits as much carbon dioxide as a natural gas power plant,
and the carbon dioxide it buries is being used to force more oil out of the
ground.
The 110-megawatt Boundary Dam project, operated by
provincial power utility SaskPower, is a refurbished coal-fired generator.
It includes new post-combustion technology designed to absorb and capture 90
percent of the carbon dioxide in the plant’s exhaust, one approach to
so-called carbon capture and storage, or CCS.
Continued in article
"Wikipedia, a Professor's Best Friend," by Dariusz Jemielniak,
Chronicle of Higher Education, October 13, 2014 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Wikipedia-a-Professors-Best/149337/?cid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
Jensen Comment
I am a cheerleader for Wikipedia. However, one of my criticisms is that coverage
across academic disciplines is highly variable. For example, coverage of
economics and finance is fantastic. Coverage of accountancy can best be
described as lousy. It's a Pogo thing. When I look for the enemy I discover that
"He is us."
Disciplines covered extensively are generally strong in both theory and
academic debate, particularly philosophy and science. Accountancy is weak in
theory and the top academic research journals in
accounting will not publish replications or even commentaries. This
greatly limits anything interesting that can be posted to Wikipedia ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm
Academic leaders in philosophy and science are nearly all covered extensively
in Wikipedia. Academic leaders in accountancy are rarely mentioned, and when
they are mentioned their Wikipedia modules are puny and boring.
What academic accounting leader has an extensive Wikipedia module? I've never
found a single one.
When I look up academic economists I not only find frequent Wikipedia
modules, virtually all of those modules contain summaries of their research and
summaries of controversies surrounding their research. I've never found a
Wikipedia article about an academic accounting researcher that contains
summaries of the controversies surrounding that professor's research.
Accounting research won't have much respect in the world until its leading
researchers are in Wikipedia, including summaries of controversies of their
research findings. The enemy is us.
Bob Jensen's threads on Wikipedia are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm
"Grade Inflation—Why Princeton Threw in the Towel," by Russell K.
Nieli, Minding the Campus, October 15, 2014 ---
http://www.mindingthecampus.com/2014/10/grade-inflation-why-princeton-threw-in-the-towel/
Thank you Barry Rice for the heads up!
Bob Jensen's threads on grade inflation are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Assess.htm#RateMyProfessor
"Beyond Emmy and Sophie: Resources for Learning about Women in Math,"
by Evelyn Lamb, News 360, October 14, 2014 ---
http://news360.com/article/261723431#
Thank you Linda Specht for the heads up.
Bob Jensen's threads on the history of women at work ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm#Women
Bob Jensen's threads on free online mathematics tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
From the CFO Journal's Morning Ledger on October 15, 2014
For Southwest Airlines, steep learning curve
http://online.wsj.com/articles/steep-learning-curve-for-southwest-airlines-as-it-flies-overseas-1413326936?mod=djemCFO_h
Southwest Airlines Co.’s
addition of overseas flights has required big changes at the Dallas-based
airline, including revamping its reservation system and retraining its
staff. The airline grew into the nation’s fourth biggest over the past four
decades by flying exclusively within the U.S. But with dwindling growth
opportunities at home, it has started launching flights to the Caribbean and
two tourist destinations in Mexico, with other international routes coming
soon.
Fusion Power ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power
Bringing Star Power to Earth ---
https://lasers.llnl.gov/
"Lockheed says makes breakthrough on fusion energy project,"
by Andrea Shalal, Reuters via Yahoo News, October 16, 2014 ---
http://news.yahoo.com/lockheed-says-makes-breakthrough-fusion-energy-project-123840986--finance.html?bcmt=comments-postbox
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lockheed Martin Corp
said on Wednesday it had made a technological breakthrough in developing a
power source based on nuclear fusion, and the first reactors, small enough
to fit on the back of a truck, could be ready for use in a decade.
Continued in article
"Scientists Are Bashing Lockheed Martin's Nuclear Fusion
'Breakthrough'," by Jessica Orwig, Business Insider, October 15, 2014
---
http://www.businessinsider.com/scientists-bash-lockheed-on-nuclear-fusion-2014-10
Researchers at Lockheed Martin Corporation's Skunk
Works,
announced on Oct. 15 their ongoing work on a new
nuclear fusion technology that could bring about functional, operational
nuclear reactors in the next 10 years.
But most scientists and science communicators we
talked to are skeptical of the claim.
"The nuclear engineering clearly fails to be cost
effective," Tom Jarboe told Business Insider in an email. Jarboe is a
professor of aeronautics and astronautics, an adjunct professor in physics,
and a researcher with the
University of Washington's
nuclear fusion experiment.
The premise behind Lockheed's 10-year-plan is the
smaller size of their device. The scientists are designing an improved
version of a compact fusion reactor (CFR). The CFR generates power from
nuclear fusion by extracting energy through the extremely hot plasma
contained inside it.
The plasma consists of hydrogen atoms that, when
heated to billions of degrees, fuse together. When this happens they release
energy, which the CFR then extracts and can eventually transfer into
electricity.
Traditional containment vessels for these plasmas
are called tokamaks that look like hollowed-out doughnuts and are the size
of an average apartment. Lockheed claims that their new CFR can generate 10
times more power than a tokamak in a space that could fit on the back of a
large truck, according to
Aviation Week. But Jarboe disagrees.
"This design has two doughnuts and a shell so it
will be more than four times as bad as a tokamak," Jarboe
stated, adding that, "Our concept [at the University of Washington] has no
coils surrounded by plasma and solves the problem."
Although Lockheed Martin issued a
press release stating that they have several
pending patents for their approach, they have yet to publish any scientific
papers on this latest work.
"It's really great that Lockheed has taken an
interest in this important challenge of providing carbon-free energy to the
world," Michael Zarnstorff, deputy director for research at the Princeton
Plasma Physics Laboratory, told Business Insider in an email. "We haven't
seen any results from the Lockheed experiments but the design is an
interesting concept and it looks like they are at a very early stage of
exploring this configuration."
While Zarnstorff remains optimistic, others are not
ready to believe the hype.
Swadesh M. Mahajan, a thermonuclear plasma
physicist at the University of Texas,
told Mother Jones reporter James West that there
were many reasons to be skeptical of the announcement. Specifically, "we
know of no materials that would be able to handle anywhere near that amount
of heat," for a device as small as Lockheed is proposing.
As of now, Lockheed's results are purely
theoretical so it's hard to know whether they will work in reality, Rose
Reed, an assistant professor of physics at Wayne State University and
researcher at the Large Hadron Collider,
told Mother Jones.
When asked if the concept of Lockheed's new design
is in any way unique or novel, Zarnstorff told Business Insider that it was
too early to tell.
Continued in article
"Shakespeare’s Genius Is Nonsense: What the Bard can
teach science about language and the limits of the human mind," by Jillian
Hinchliffe & Seth Frey Illustration by Katherine Guillen & Eleanor Davis,
Nautilus, October 9, 2014
http://nautil.us/issue/18/genius/shakespeares-genius-is-nonsense
In the digital age, we read strategically. We target, we search,
we skim. We don’t dig; we sift. The result: information, not knowledge
"The Dagger of Faith in the Digital Age: A vitriolic medieval manuscript
illuminates how Google is destroying the act of reading," by Ryan Szpiech,
Tablet Magazine, October 7, 2014 ---
http://tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/books/183443/dagger-digital-age?all=1
Web Publishing Pleasures Versus Journal Publishing Agonies
Jensen Comment
I once recall being at a conference where Baruch Lev made a comment that he was
not looking forward to a summer of doing battle with journal referees.
Personally, I no longer want to do battles with referees and post my essays at
my Website and a listserv called AECM --- letting the chips fall as they may. I
almost always publish replies from readers at my Website, with their permission.
That is about the only type of refereeing that my writings encounter these days.
My debates on the listserv are more rewarding to me that all my years of trying
to accommodate journal referees.
Since journals like the American Accounting Association journals are not
available to Web crawlers like Google and Yahoo, I get far more feedback from my
Web publishing than I ever did from my journal publishing, feedback from global
strangers who do not subscribe to AAA journals. In most respects I feel that I
have far more people around the world reading my Web articles than people who
read my formal journal articles.
There is a natural science journal called eLIFE that tries to strike a
balance between the perfectionism demands of referees and the publishing of
non-refereed working papers.
eLIFE (a natural sciences research journal that avoids endless cycles of
revisions) ---
http://elifesciences.org
Initial decisions are made in a few days,
post-review decisions in about a month, and most articles go through only
one round of revision. Every author also has the option to make their
accepted manuscript openly available shortly after receiving a final
decision
However, I don't think eLIFE articles, like most journal articles, can
be found by Web crawlers. That is sad. This suggests that authors should do
pre-publication of working papers on their Web servers or in pre-publication
outlets like SSRN and bioRxiv.org that are crawled over daily by the Web search
engines.
Of course authors who need journal articles for reputation building,
promotion, and tenure in the Academy I do not recommend avoiding the agonies of
battles with referees in journal article publishing. However, once they hit a
certain point in their careers where they want more pleasure than pain from
their writing endeavors, I highly recommend Web and listserv publishing,
including blog publishing. I have three blogs that give me pleasure.
Bob Jensen's 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
"4 Keys to Designing the Classroom of the Future," by Greg
Thomson, T.H.E. Journal, October 15, 2014 ---
http://thejournal.com/articles/2014/10/15/4-keys-to-designing-the-classroom-of-the-future.aspx
Forget about rows of desks pointed at a
whiteboard. Here's how mobile technology is reshaping teaching and learning.
Designing the classroom of the future is no easy
task, mostly because it's difficult to know what the future will look like.
As little as five years ago, few could have predicted the ubiquity of
tablets and their accompanying need for more and more WiFi capabilities.
Even the maker movement's reliance on "creative spaces" is a relatively new
phenomenon.
As quickly as new technologies arise, other devices
previously deemed indispensable fall out of favor. Take the interactive
whiteboard (IWB), for example. According to J.D. Ferries-Rowe, chief
information officer at Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School in Indianapolis,
the school made a sizable investment in IWBs about a decade ago. These days,
Ferries-Rowe can't resist criticizing the boards as inherently
"teacher-driven."
Ferries-Rowe works closely with Brebeuf Assistant
Principal Jen LaMaster, and both are keenly tuned in to 21st century
learning. "With interactive boards, teachers are standing there tapping,
essentially using it like a chalk board," said LaMaster, with a trace of
wistfulness. "It pretends to be interactive, but the most interactive you
can be is two kids standing at the board and 18 watching. It's the opposite
of an experiential activity."
"Interactive boards are on their way out," agreed
Sam Farsaii, chief technology officer for the Coppell Independent School
District in Dallas. "With inexpensive devices such as tablets, and a
projector system, you can simulate whiteboard activities in an even more
interactive way." Farsaii pointed out that even the physical height of
interactive boards can be problematic, particularly for elementary students.
In the interest of cost-effectiveness, Farsaii reported that IWBs will stay
in the Coppell district "as long as the products function, to maximize their
use," but he and Ferries-Rowe agree that interactive whiteboards are a prime
example of how tricky it can be to plan a classroom around any one
technology. "I refuse to write a technology plan that goes beyond five
years," said Ferries-Rowe. "Anything beyond five years is
Continued in article
Bob Jensen's neglected threads on classroom design are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#Design
Jensen Comment
Occasionally in my Web surfing I encounter a working paper or even a published
article that contains an order:
"Do not cite without permission." I assume this also means do not link to the
paper even though it is linked on Google.
This clause strikes me as unethical in an academic world. At
worst it enables the authors to avoid being criticized for data, research
methods, and/or findings. At best it encourages replies suggesting improvements
to the authors but not the rest of the world, which to me strikes me as being
selfish and self-serving for the authors.
We obviously cannot ban such papers from the Web, but we can
certainly ignore such papers.
But what if we don't ignore them? We can refer to the findings as
"anonymous" without quoting from the papers or giving the authors their due
credit.
For example, one paper in question that I stumbled on this
morning concludes that married women at all levels in the USA full-time female
workforce are paid more on average than unmarried women. To me this is a
misleading finding. There is a skewness in marriage where there are higher
proportions of unmarried women at younger ages. Workers in general tend to be
paid less at younger ages. Hence, the lower pay of single women probably has
more to do with age than marital status.
The USA's Poorest and Richest Cities Are Not the Biggest Cities (except
for the San Jose metropolis) ---
Click Here
http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/10/15/americas-poorest-cities-2/?utm_source=247WallStDailyNewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=OCT152014A&utm_campaign=DailyNewsletter
The USA's Largest Cities ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population
"IBM Is in Even Worse Shape Than It Seemed," by Nick Summers,
Bloomberg Businessweek, October 20, 2014 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-10-20/ibm-is-in-even-worse-shape-than-it-seemed?campaign_id=DN102014
Like a driver obeying the commands of a GPS system
even as passengers shout that the car is clearly headed toward a ditch,
IBM’s chief executive officer, Ginni Rometty, has followed the profit
“roadmap” laid out by her predecessor. The company was going to reach $20 in
adjusted earnings per share by 2015, damn it, even as nine straight quarters
of sinking revenue made that an increasingly untenable feat of financial
engineering. IBM (IBM) laid off workers, fiddled with its tax rate, took on
debt, and bought back a staggering number of its own shares to make the math
work, even as all that left the company less able to compete with the likes
of Amazon.com (AMZN) and Google (GOOG) in cloud computing.
Today Rometty finally abandoned “Roadmap 2015,”
announcing that IBM cannot hit the target after all. IBM also said it will
pay a chipmaker called GlobalFoundries $1.5 billion to take its chip
division off its hands, while also taking a $4.7 billion charge. And IBM
reported its third-quarter results—a 10th consecutive period of falling
sales, marked by weaker performance in growth markets. “We are disappointed
in our performance,” Rometty said in a statement. “We saw a marked slowdown
in September in client buying behavior, and our results also point to the
unprecedented pace of change in our industry.” In response, shares of IBM
were down more than 7 percent on Monday morning, Oct. 20.
I wrote, for a May 22 Bloomberg Businessweek
cover story, about Rometty’s
nearly impossible task of reinventing IBM for the era of cloud computing
while handcuffed by the “Roadmap.” IBM is 103
years old and has survived upheavals in the technology industry
before—selling mainframes, then personal computers, then getting into the
consulting game. Rometty will tell anyone who listens that the changes
demanded of IBM today are as great as they’ve ever been. One question is
whether IBM has the technical chops to compete with Amazon and others: After
losing a lucrative CIA cloud project to the upstart, IBM had to acquire a
small competitor, SoftLayer, to competently provide the services its
customers are now demanding. The arrival of cheap cloud computing means that
corporations don’t need IBM’s big, expensive mainframes. And even if IBM
does catch up, the cloud might be such a thin-margined industry that it
can’t sustain the profit margins IBM had been telling investors to expect.
Until today.
This morning’s selloff is the worst in four years
for IBM, Bloomberg News reported. “IBM needs to find success and growth in
the cloud through organic and acquisitive means,” Daniel Ives, an analyst at
FBR Capital Markets,
told BN. “Otherwise there could be some darker
days ahead for the tech giant and its investors.” In other words: Focus not
on financials but on making stuff people will pay money for, or else.
Continued in article
Learning Management System (LMS)---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_management_system
"Dueling LMS Lawsuits," by Carl Straumsheim, Inside Higher Ed,
October 16, 2014 ---
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/10/16/university-and-lms-provider-sue-each-other-breach-contract
From the Scout Report on October 17, 2014
Mailbox ---
http://www.mailboxapp.com
According to the McKinsley Global Institute, the
average worker spends about a quarter of her time at the office managing
email. Mailbox wants to make all that easier. They’ve redesigned the inbox
to make your mobile device a swifter, more efficient template for emailing.
The app uses quick swipe and a chat-like view of entire conversations to
make this possible. Available for iOS 7.0+ and Android 4.0.3+.
BigOven ---
http://www.bigoven.com/mobile
BigOven is a big deal. It was chosen as a “Best App
for Foodies” by Time Magazine and a “Best App for Eating” by the New York
Times. It’s free, it’s easy to use, and it lets you keep track of up to
350,000 recipes on your handheld device. You can search the app by keyword,
course, ingredient, or just browse popular recipes. This app is compatible
with a variety of devices running iOS 7.0+ and Android 2.3+.
500 Pound Kangaroos Didn’t Hop, Skip, or Jump
Stop the hop: for huge ancient kangaroos, hopping was dicey
http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/10/15/us-science-kangaroos-idINKCN0I42AG20141015
Extinct giant kangaroos did not hop… they walked
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/11165469/Extinct-giant-kangaroos-did-not-hop...they-walked.html
Meet the Lumbering, Quarter-Ton, Extinct Kangaroo
http://time.com/3503553/kangaroo-giant-extinct/
Monster Kangaroo Was a Walker, Not a Hopper
http://news.discovery.com/animals/monster-kangaroo-was-a-walker-not-a-hopper-141015.htm
Procoptodon goliah - Australian Museum
http://australianmuseum.net.au/Procoptodon-goliah/
Locomotion in Extinct Giant Kangaroos: Were Sthenurines Hop-Less Monsters?
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0109888
From the Scout Report on October 24, 2014
Quip ---
https://quip.com
If you’re looking for a way to collaborate on
office projects (documents, spreadsheets, lists, and chat), look no further
than Quip. This app allows you to work in real time with your collaborators
in a handy framework that keeps everything fluid yet structured. Recently
updated for Android (4.0.3+), the app was originally designed for iOS
(7.0+). Newer versions take care of old bugs that you’ll read about in last
year’s reviews.
Jensen Comment
Accounting professors too often forget that American Accounting Association
members can use the AAA Commons free for worldwide collaboration projects in
the "hives" of the Commons ---
http://aaacommons.org/
Microsoft OneDrive ---
https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-us/
You can think of Microsoft OneDrive as a a Google
Drive equivalent, if Google Drive would actually let you use the Office
Suite (Word, Excel, etc.). The app gets bomber reviews all over the web for
its clear interface and adaptability. Cleared for takeoff with iOS (7.0+),
Android (4.0+), Windows, and Windows Phone.
The Latest on Climate Change
Another global warming contrarian paper found to be unrealistic and
inaccurate
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/oct/21/global-warming-contrarian-paper-unrealistic-inaccurate
After record warm September, 2014 is on track to warmest year, NOAA says
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2014/10/20/after-record-warm-september-2014-is-on-track-to-warmest-year-noaa-says/
Hot News: 2014 On Track to Become Warmest Year
http://www.livescience.com/48365-hot-news-2014-on-track-to-become-warmest-year.html
Global Warming News
http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/earth_climate/global_warming/
Mini multiples display decades of sea ice in a trice
http://climate.nasa.gov/news/2168/
What EPA is Doing: Climate Change
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/EPAactivities.html
Free online textbooks, cases, and tutorials in accounting, finance,
economics, and statistics ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks
Education Tutorials
explore (videos on exploration) ---
http://explore.org
Fun English Games for Kids - Free Teaching Resources Online ---
http://www.funenglishgames.com/
Bob Jensen's threads on general education tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#EducationResearch
Alaska Resources Library and Information Services ---
http://www.arlis.org
Bob Jensen's bookmarks for multiple disciplines ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm
Engineering, Science, and Medicine Tutorials
Bringing Star Power to Earth ---
https://lasers.llnl.gov/
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory ---
http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu
American Institute of Physics ---
http://www.aip.org/history-programs/physics-history
10 Mind-Blowing Facts About Black Holes ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/what-black-holes-really-are-2014-10
NASA Probe Just Beamed Back The First Pictures Of Icy Craters On The Closest
Planet To The Sun, Mercury ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-first-pictures-of-ice-on-mercury-2014-10
New Animated Web Series Makes the Theory of Evolution Easy to Understand ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/DqtfW6iSYmQ/new-animated-web-series-makes-the-theory-of-evolution-easy-to-understand.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Measurement Science for Complex Information Systems ---
http://nist.gov/itl/antd/emergent_behavior.cfm
American Council on Science and Health ---
http://acsh.org
eLIFE (a natural sciences research journal that avoids endless cycles of
revisions) ---
http://elifesciences.org
Initial decisions are made in a few days,
post-review decisions in about a month, and most articles go through only
one round of revision. Every author also has the option to make their
accepted manuscript openly available shortly after receiving a final
decision
bioRxiv.org (in the era of technology research publishing is still in a horse
and buggy age ---
http://biorxiv.org
Example: A forthcoming paper in The Accounting Review took 11
months to be accepted after first being submitted. It will take more months to
be published after acceptance. Like many papers published initially in SSRN the
eventual publishing in research journals proceeds at a horse and buggy pace.
SSRN ---
http://www.ssrn.com/en/
bioRxiv.org ---
http://biorxiv.org
bioRxiv (pronounced "bio-archive") is a free online
archive and distribution service for unpublished preprints in the life
sciences. It is operated by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, a not-for-profit
research and educational institution. By posting preprints on bioRxiv,
authors are able to make their findings immediately available to the
scientific community and receive feedback on draft manuscripts before they
are submitted to journals.
explore (videos on exploration) ---
http://explore.org
The Panda’s Thumb (intellectual support of the theory of evolution) ---
http://www.pandasthumb.org
Climate Science, Awareness and Solutions ---
http://csas.ei.columbia.edu
The Encyclopedia of Earth: Biodiversity ---
http://www.eoearth.org/topics/view/51cbfc78f702fc2ba8129e70/
Green Revolution: Curse or Blessing? ---
http://www.ifpri.org/sites/default/files/pubs/pubs/ib/ib11.pdf
Alaska Resources Library and Information Services ---
http://www.arlis.org
The Philosophy of Skepticism
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry ---
http://www.csicop.org
Center for Science in the Public Interest ---
http://www.cspinet.org
From the Scout Report on October 24, 2014
The Latest on Climate Change
Another global warming contrarian paper found to be unrealistic and
inaccurate
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/oct/21/global-warming-contrarian-paper-unrealistic-inaccurate
After record warm September, 2014 is on track to warmest year, NOAA says
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2014/10/20/after-record-warm-september-2014-is-on-track-to-warmest-year-noaa-says/
Hot News: 2014 On Track to Become Warmest Year
http://www.livescience.com/48365-hot-news-2014-on-track-to-become-warmest-year.html
Global Warming News
http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/earth_climate/global_warming/
Mini multiples display decades of sea ice in a trice
http://climate.nasa.gov/news/2168/
What EPA is Doing: Climate Change
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/EPAactivities.html
Bob Jensen's threads on free online science,
engineering, and medicine tutorials are at ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Social Science and Economics Tutorials
Economist’s View (Economic News and Writings of Famous Economists) ---
http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/
The Graduate Wife ---
http://thegraduatewife.com
American Council on Science and Health ---
http://acsh.org
Association for Psychological Science ---
http://www.psychologicalscience.org
Stanley Milgram’s experiments were not so much about proving a hypothesis as
about performing a play. Poor science, but great art ---
The psychology of torture The Milgram experiments
showed that anybody could be capable of torture when obeying an authority. Are
they still valid?
http://aeon.co/magazine/psychology/why-do-we-keep-repeating-the-milgram-experiments/
Human Development Reports ---
http://hdr.undp.org/en/countries
bioRxiv.org (in the era of technology research publishing is still in a horse
and buggy age) ---
http://biorxiv.org
Example: A forthcoming paper in The Accounting Review took 11
months to be accepted after first being submitted. It will take more months to
be published after acceptance. Like many papers published initially in SSRN the
eventual publishing in research journals proceeds at a horse and buggy pace.
SSRN ---
http://www.ssrn.com/en/
bioRxiv.org ---
http://biorxiv.org
bioRxiv (pronounced "bio-archive") is a free online
archive and distribution service for unpublished preprints in the life
sciences. It is operated by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, a not-for-profit
research and educational institution. By posting preprints on bioRxiv,
authors are able to make their findings immediately available to the
scientific community and receive feedback on draft manuscripts before they
are submitted to journals.
The Philosophy of Skepticism
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry ---
http://www.csicop.org
Different From the Others (1919): The First Gay Rights Movie Ever … Later
Destroyed by the Nazis ---
Click Here
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/FwwuWd-NRuw/different-from-the-others-1919-the-first-gay-rights-movie-in-history.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Intelligence and the Camp David Accords ---
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/historical-collection-publications/president-carter-and-the-camp-david-accords/index.html
Alaska Resources Library and Information Services ---
http://www.arlis.org
Center for Science in the Public Interest ---
http://www.cspinet.org
Bob Jensen's threads on Economics, Anthropology, Social Sciences, and
Philosophy tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Law and Legal Studies
Wall Street Accountability through Sustainable Funding Act ---
https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/5490
Bob Jensen's threads on law and legal studies are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Math and Statistics Tutorials
Online Statistics Education ---
http://onlinestatbook.com/2/
Wolfram Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine ---
http://www.wolframalpha.com
Bob Jensen's Illustrations on the Use of Wolfram Alpha in Cost Accounting ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/theorylearningcurves.htm
"23 Ways To Make Money Using The Nerdiest Site (Wolfram Alpha) On The
Internet," by Walter Hickey, Business Insider, July 9, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-use-wolfram-alpha-for-finance-2013-7
Developed by the "Smartest Guy on the Planet"
"32 Tricks You Can Do With Wolfram Alpha, The Most Useful Site In The History
Of The Internet," by Walter Hickey, Business Insider, July 9, 2013 ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/awesome-things-you-can-do-with-wolfram-alpha-2013-7
Introduction to Statistical Thinking (With R, Without Calculus) ---
http://pluto.huji.ac.il/~msby/StatThink/IntroStat.pdf
StatsTeachR ---
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kE1jZcJhBgM/U1vQwFH-ZVI/AAAAAAAACX8/ca6nLTAtP8U/s1600/Capture.GIF
Econometrician David Giles claims this is a great resource ---
http://davegiles.blogspot.com/2014/04/great-resource-for-teaching-statistics.html
"Beyond Emmy and Sophie: Resources for Learning about Women in Math," by
Evelyn Lamb, News 360, October 14, 2014 ---
http://news360.com/article/261723431#
Alaska Resources Library and Information Services ---
http://www.arlis.org
Bob Jensen's threads on free online mathematics tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
History Tutorials
Favorite Poem Project (videos of 50 USA poets) ---
http://www.favoritepoem.org
The Philosophy of Skepticism
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry ---
http://www.csicop.org
The First 500 Books From The Vatican Library's Massive Digitization Project
Are Now Online ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-first-500-books-from-the-vatican-librarys-massive-digitisation-project-are-now-online-2014-10
Hear Michel Foucault’s Final UC Berkeley Lectures, “Discourse and Truth”
(1983) ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/4Ntvxk910iY/michel-foucaults-final-uc-berkeley-lectures-discourse-and-truth-1983.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
American Historical Association ---
http://www.historians.org
Take Big History: A Free Short Course on 13.8 Billion Years of History,
Funded by Bill Gates ---
http://www.openculture.com/2014/10/big-history-free-short-course.html
The Arts at MIT ---
http://arts.mit.edu
Children’s Books ---
http://childrensbooks.about.com
Fun English Games for Kids - Free Teaching Resources Online ---
http://www.funenglishgames.com/
The Life of a City: Early Films of New York, 1898-1906 ---
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/papr/nychome.html
New-York Historical Society, Photographs of New York City and Beyond ---
http://cdm16694.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/p16124coll2
Long Island Collection ---
http://guides.library.stonybrook.edu/long_islan
Bob Jensen's threads on history tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Also see
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm
Language Tutorials
Bob Jensen's links to language tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Music Tutorials
Bob Jensen's threads on free music tutorials are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookbob2.htm
Bob Jensen's threads on music performances ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm
Writing Tutorials
Fun English Games for Kids - Free Teaching Resources Online ---
http://www.funenglishgames.com/
Steven Pinker Identifies 10 Breakable Grammatical Rules: “Who” Vs. “Whom,”
Dangling Modifiers & More ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/ElphvkULX1M/steven-pinker-identifies-10-breakable-grammatical-rules.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
Bob Jensen's helpers for writers are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob3.htm#Dictionaries
Updates from WebMD ---
http://www.webmd.com/
October 15, 2014
October 16, 2014
October 18, 2014
October 20, 2014
October 21, 2014
October 22, 2014
October 23, 2014
October 24, 2014
October 27, 2014
From PhysOrg on October 15, 2014
Possible breast cancer 'achilles heel' discovered, Oct 15, 2014
Researchers boost the heart's natural ability to recover after heart attack,
Oct 15, 2014
How malaria is shaping the human genome, Oct 15, 2014
Change
your walking style, change your mood, Oct 15, 2014
Dopamine cell therapy for Parkinson's shows promise, Oct 15, 2014
Discovery of a new mechanism that can lead to blindness, Oct 15, 2014
Researchers look to exploit females' natural resistance to infection,
Oct 15, 2014
Brain's compass relies on geometric relationships, say researchers (w/
Video), Oct 15, 2014
Study monitors effects of IV fluid on dog circulation during surgery (w/
Video), Oct 15, 2014
Study to evaluate timing of pushing on C-section rates, birth complications,
Oct 15, 2014
Effects of high-risk Parkinson's mutation are reversible, Oct 15, 2014
How a memory boost from exercising could pass on to your baby, Oct 15,
2014
New miniature device monitors heart failure patients remotely, Oct 15,
2014
Jeff Bezos ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Bezos
Question
Do you suppose Jeff Bezos planted the Ebola virus?
(Just Kidding, but what a windfall for Amazon)
"Experts Offer Steps for Avoiding Public Hysteria, a Different Contagious
Threat," by Benedict Care, The New York Times, October 15, 2014 ---
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/16/health/ebolas-other-contagious-threat-hysteria.html?_r=0
New York City Rats Are More Dangerous Than Anyone Realized ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/columbia-study-nyc-rat-viruses-bacteria-2014-10
Stanley Milgram ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Milgram
Stanley Milgram’s experiments were not so much about proving a hypothesis as
about performing a play. Poor science, but great art ---
The psychology of torture The Milgram experiments
showed that anybody could be capable of torture when obeying an authority. Are
they still valid?
http://aeon.co/magazine/psychology/why-do-we-keep-repeating-the-milgram-experiments/
Also see Phil Zimbardo's infamous Stanford Experiment and his book on The
Lucifer Effect ---
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Zimbardo
New front in war on Alzheimer's and other protein-linked brain diseases ---
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-10-front-war-alzheimer-protein-linked-brain.html
Get the New 7-Minute Workout on Your Mobile Device: A Free App from The
New York Times ---
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenCulture/~3/lFg4WGRv4vY/get-the-new-7-minute-workout-on-your-mobile-device.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email
A Bit of Humor
Paula forwarded the tentative title of her forthcoming autobiography:
Well That Didn't Work by Paula
The 10 Most Ridiculous Excuses People Have Used To Call In Sick
http://www.businessinsider.com/ridiculous-excuses-for-calling-in-sick-2014-10
Forwarded by Scott
A malapropism is the misuse of a word that sounds similar to the intended
word, resulting in a nonsensical, but amusing sentence. Named after Mrs
Malaprop — a character in Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s play The Rivals, who
was particularly prone to them.
‘It’s great to be back on terra cotta’ — John Prescott, meaning ‘terra
firma’, after a stormy flight.
‘I am a person who recognises the fallacy of humans’ — George W. Bush,
meaning ‘fallibility’, to Oprah Winfrey.
‘He eludes confidence’ — William Bratton, Los Angeles police chief, of
Barack Obama’s second inauguration speech. He meant ‘exudes’.
Deferring payments on Government debt would ‘only be playing smokes and
daggers’ — Bertie Ahern, former Irish prime minister, meaning possibly
‘snakes and ladders’ or ‘cloak and dagger’.
‘It’s not the sanity of picket lines that bothers me, it’s the sanity of
human life’ — John Prescott (again!) meaning ‘sanctity’.
More at -
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2804203/It-s-great-terracotta-Prezza-s-malapropisms-toe-curling-puns-new-book-revels-quirks-English-language.html
Prof. Jensen will like the anagrams I think.
‘I don’t like it. When you open that Pandora’s box, you will find it full
of Trojan horses’
Scott Bonacker CPA – McCullough and Associates LLC – Springfield, MO
Humor Between October 1-31, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q4.htm#Humor103114
Humor Between September 1-30, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q3.htm#Humor093014
Humor Between August 1-31, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q3.htm#Humor083114
Humor Between July 1-31, 2014---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q3.htm#Humor073114
Humor Between June 1-31, 2014 ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q2.htm#Humor063014
Humor Between May 1-31, 2014, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q2.htm#Humor053114
Humor Between April 1-30, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q2.htm#Humor043014
Humor Between March 1-31, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q1.htm#Humor033114
Humor Between February 1-28, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q1.htm#Humor022814
Humor Between January 1-31, 2014
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book14q1.htm#Humor013114
Humor Between December 1-31, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q4.htm#Humor123113
Humor Between November 1-30, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q4.htm#Humor113013,
Humor Between October 1-31, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q4.htm#Humor103113
Humor Between September 1 and September 30, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q3.htm#Humor093013
Humor Between July 1 and August 31, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q3.htm#Humor083113
Humor Between June 1-30, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q2.htm#Humor063013
Humor Between May 1-31, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q2.htm#Humor053113
Humor Between April 1-30, 2013
---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/book13q2.htm#Humor043013
Tidbits Archives ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
More of Bob Jensen's Pictures and
Stories
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm
Update in
2014
20-Year Sugar Hill Master Plan ---
http://www.nccouncil.org/images/NCC/file/wrkgdraftfeb142014.pdf
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/
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
The Cult of Statistical Significance:
How Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and Lives ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/temp/DeirdreMcCloskey/StatisticalSignificance01.htm
How Accountics Scientists Should Change:
"Frankly, Scarlett, after I get a hit for my resume in The Accounting Review
I just don't give a damn"
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/temp/AccounticsDamn.htm
One more mission in what's left of my life will be to try to change this
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/temp/AccounticsDamn.htm
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.
Accounting and Taxation News Sites ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/AccountingNews.htm
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://listserv.aaahq.org/cgi-bin/wa.exe?HOME
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.
Over the years the AECM has become the worldwide forum for
accounting educators on all issues of accountancy and accounting
education, including debates on accounting standards, managerial
accounting, careers, fraud, forensic accounting, auditing,
doctoral programs, and critical debates on academic (accountics)
research, publication, replication, and validity testing.
|
CPAS-L
(Practitioners)
http://pacioli.loyola.edu/cpas-l/ (Closed
Down)
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] |
FEI's Financial Reporting Blog
Smart Stops on the Web, Journal of Accountancy, March 2008 ---
http://www.aicpa.org/pubs/jofa/mar2008/smart_stops.htm
FINANCIAL REPORTING PORTAL
www.financialexecutives.org/blog
Find news highlights from the SEC, FASB
and the International Accounting
Standards Board on this financial
reporting blog from Financial Executives
International. The site, updated daily,
compiles regulatory news, rulings and
statements, comment letters on
standards, and hot topics from the Web’s
largest business and accounting
publications and organizations. Look for
continuing coverage of SOX requirements,
fair value reporting and the Alternative
Minimum Tax, plus emerging issues such
as the subprime mortgage crisis,
international convergence, and rules for
tax return preparers. |
|
|
The CAlCPA Tax Listserv September 4, 2008 message from Scott Bonacker
[lister@bonackers.com]
Scott has been a long-time contributor to the AECM listserv (he's a techie as
well as a practicing CPA)
I found another listserve
that is exceptional -
CalCPA maintains
http://groups.yahoo.com/taxtalk/
and they let almost anyone join it.
Jim Counts, CPA is moderator.
There are several highly
capable people that make frequent answers to tax questions posted there, and
the answers are often in depth.
Scott
Scott forwarded the following message from Jim
Counts
Yes you may mention info on
your listserve about TaxTalk. As part of what you say please say [... any
CPA or attorney or a member of the Calif Society of CPAs may join. It is
possible to join without having a free Yahoo account but then they will not
have access to the files and other items posted.
Once signed in on their Yahoo account go to
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/TaxTalk/ and I believe in
top right corner is Join Group. Click on it and answer the few questions and
in the comment box say you are a CPA or attorney, whichever you are and I
will get the request to join.
Be aware that we run on the average 30 or move emails per day. I encourage
people to set up a folder for just the emails from this listserve and then
via a rule or filter send them to that folder instead of having them be in
your inbox. Thus you can read them when you want and it will not fill up the
inbox when you are looking for client emails etc.
We currently have about 830 CPAs and attorneys nationwide but mainly in
California.... ]
Please encourage your members
to join our listserve.
If any questions let me know.
Jim Counts CPA.CITP CTFA
Hemet, CA
Moderator TaxTalk
|
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
Bob Jensen's
Threads ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.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