The Weekly Blab
Volume 5, Issue 16—December 13,
2010
Merry
Christmas to All
This is the last issue of the Blab for
2010 (unless I decide at the last minute to do a big Las Vegas special). I hope everyone has a great Christmas and New
Year, and I’ll catch you all on the flip side, for the first issue of 2011.
Why
I Love/Hate Technology
I got a great toy the other day—an
internet radio/media player, which connects to my receiver, hooks to my Wi-Fi
network, and allows me to play internet radio, anything on iTunes on my
computer, and any online music service through my stereo. I took it out of the box, plugged it in,
connected it with RCA cables to the stereo, and it immediately found my Wi-Fi
network. Bingo—instant internet
radio. It turned out that the software
for the computer (called Twonky software, and it was
a bit twonky!) was out of date, but I quickly found
the current software online and after downloading it and starting it up, it
worked instantly to allow me to stream my iTunes. So, the gizmo works exactly as stated. I’ve been listening to some Israeli radio
stations, some jazz stations, and an old-time radio station from where I grew
up. It’s a funny thing—we used to have
trouble picking up that station over the air when I was a kid (the station was
in Oswego, and we lived in Syracuse), but I can now easily pick it up in
Atlanta via the internet. OK, that’s all
great, but of course I’ve been trying for three days to register the product
online, and the website is constantly down.
Furthermore, I had a problem with my
cell phone. Somehow, both Jill and I had
“approved” some texting thing that was adding $10 per month each to our
account. I went to Verizon, got them to
take it off and block it from coming back.
I looked at my subsequent bill, and it was actually $1 higher! So, I called Verizon to see what was up, and
they told me I hadn’t updated my phone (or Jill’s), and the bill wouldn’t drop
until I did. It might have been nice if
they had mentioned that. Anyway, I
updated, and within 60 seconds my bill was adjusted downward, with a credit
applied for the previous month. I also
found out there’s an app for getting internet radio on my cell phone, but since
I have a Blackberry Storm (and not a Storm II), it seems that only half the
stations work. Still, that’s a lot of
radio. So—new toys,
new fun, and new problems.
Happy
Holidays—SPSU Style
The holiday season is well underway, and
there are parties everywhere! The week
began with the Door Judging Contest. It
was a bit cold going around from building to building, but seeing all the
attractive doors was fun as always, and selecting the best one was quite
challenging. It was a near tie, but
congratulations to Procurement, which won the big basket of goodies.
Tuesday brought the President’s party,
which was excellent as always. I also
got to have lunch with the two ELI scholars (Richard Franza
from Kennesaw and Pat Donat from North Georgia
College and State University) who are shadowing Lisa this year—nice folks both,
so say “Hi” if you see them on campus.
Wednesday, of course, was the big SPSU Holiday Luncheon. As always, the Social and Community Building
Committee did a fine job hosting it, with lots of top-flight food. I even won a first-aid kit in the
raffle! Among the highlights were Koger in a partial tux, the children’s choir, and the fine
rendition of the Twelve Days of Christmas (“two turtle doves” being the
highlight of the highlight, natch).
Thursday had a party honoring Fred Hartfield (CSE) on his retirement, immediately followed by
the Honors Graduation Party, both of which were great. Fred is an excellent faculty member and a
stand-up guy, and he will be missed at SPSU.
The Honors Graduation Party is always fun, and to see the students all
dressed up with their families and with the faculty who worked with them is
always a treat. Nancy Reichert, Alda Wood, and Ann Parker do a great job with Honors, which
has grown by leaps and bounds.
Finally, Sunday brought the SPSU Foundation
party, which was held for the first time in the ETC’s gallery. This turns out to be an excellent place to
have a party—lots of space, and the long gallery
allows things to be spread out. The
colored lights on the building’s light-pole and interior added just the right
festive touch. The food was good too! To top it all off, despite eating all this
food this past week, several people have told me that I look like I lost weight
(which is ridiculous, but I appreciate the sentiment!).
Asking
Students is Good.
No, Bad!
Everybody knows that different media
have their own take on things. You
wouldn’t expect to see the same interpretation of an event on MSNBC, for
example, as you would on Fox.
In that light, there was an interesting
article in the New York Times called “What
Works in the Classroom? Ask the Students”,
where a study costing $45 Million (funded by Bill Gates, of course) was just
released, indicating that of the 3000 public school teachers participating in
the study, those who were evaluated most highly by their students were also
delivering the best classroom instruction.
Teachers in Charlotte NC, Denver CO, Tampa FL, New York City, and
Pittsburg PA were investigated using a method called value-added modeling,
which tells how much “value” the teacher added to the student based on changes
in test scores from one year to another.
Early results showed:
Classrooms where
a majority of students said they agreed with the statement, “Our class stays busy and doesn’t waste
time,” tended to be led by teachers with high
value-added scores, the report said. The same was true for teachers whose students agreed with the statements,
“In this class, we learn to correct our mistakes,”
and, “My teacher has several good ways to explain each topic that we cover in this class.”
The article states that few of the
nation’s school public districts actually ask students about their experiences
in the classroom (in contrast to what is commonly done in college), but that
this is changing, with 20 states overhauling their evaluations systems.
This seems pretty straightforward,
right? Public schools should just do what
we do in college to evaluate their teachers.
Not so fast! On the very same day, a brief article appeared
in the Chronicle entitled “Students
Lie on Course Evaluations, Study Finds”.
In this study, students at Southeastern Oklahoma State University and at
the University of Northern Iowa were surveyed as to whether they told the truth
on course evaluations. The following
responses were obtained to the question “Have you written something untrue on the written comments
because:
You wanted
to protect a teacher?” Yes: 3.9
percent
You liked
a teacher?” Yes: 11.2 percent
You wanted
to hurt a teacher?” Yes: 2.6
percent
You disliked a
teacher?” Yes: 12.9
percent
While the article characterizes these
results as tending more to skew the results in a negative way, it seems pretty
evenly split to me. In any event, the
numbers are small and IMHO, unlikely to cause any significant difference.
Most of the blogged responses were
shocked, shocked! to see that this skewing
occurred. The best response came from “Tappat”, obviously no fan of student evaluations, who wrote
(yes—tongue in cheek!):
What are reasons people have for disliking people? Don’t you hate
it when someone keeps trying to get you to think something stupid, you know,
stuff you’ve never heard of, stuff that sounds crazy, stuff that you will never
use in any of your amorphously conceptualized but high-paying jobs you tend to
in between your life of hanging out with friends and hunting or shopping and. .
. .
Or, don’t you hate it when you’re given indications that you’re no
good at something stupid, like calculating, or rational thought, or, worst of
worse, creativity and humanity!!! and that you need to
get better at it, to get through the hoops that will keep you from the great
life that is just beyond the series of hoops? Jeeezzzz. And then, when the
person doing any of these things to you all semester long isn’t even pretty or
cute!!
OMG! I hate all of that, and I’m glad when I can slam someone like
that! It isn’t a lie, when you’re trying to hurt someone! Now don’t tell me how
I’m wrong in my thinking here — I’ll slam you, if I get the chance!!!
Accessibility
for the blind
A really interesting article appeared in
the Chronicle entitled “Colleges
Lock Out Blind Students Online”. Some blind students are protesting that
universities, when they design their online courses or websites, don’t take blind
students into consideration. The most
well-known example of this was a lawsuit against Arizona State about its use of
the Kindle e-reader in some of its classes, because while the device has
text-to-speech features that could be helpful to the blind, it lacks the
audible menus that are necessary for them to take advantage of that
feature. A public letter from the
federal Department of Justice and the Department of Education stated: “It is
unacceptable for universities to use emerging technology without insisting that
this technology be accessible to all students”. The agencies were
promptly attacked by some as being too PC, and there were lots of comments and
editorials about how ridiculous the public letter was.
What’s sad is that the devices, courses,
and websites can be made far more accessible with just a few simple changes
(that often cost next to nothing). For
example, it turns out that most blind people control their computers from a
keyboard instead of with a mouse. If
there is a clickable button as part of the program, they can’t access it (and
can’t see it to find it if they have a mouse) unless the button is keyboard
enabled. Often, they’re not. Another common problem is that many images
aren’t labeled, thereby not allowing the blind to benefit from their (often
critical) content.
The article went on to say that most
open source software is not fully accessible. “Public institutions “will not use these
materials,” Mr. Plotkin says, “because the lawsuits
that would follow would be inevitable, and very costly.” [Hal Plotkin is
a senior policy advisor and former community college trustee in California]
Alex J. Hurder, a clinical professor at
Vanderbilt University Law School, says the potential changes are “a big deal,”
because anyone in the business of preparing content for the Internet “would be
warned in advance that you need to take these factors into consideration when
you're preparing your programs. Otherwise the market will dry up for you, and
nobody will be allowed to buy them.”
While most respondents were
sympathetic, at least one went the other way:
Another case of a miniscule minority disrupting and generating
high cost to colleges, etc. The rights crowd demands that
everything be changed in an instant to cater to a statistical insignificant cause,
while ignoring the rights of the majority. That is not to say that an effort
should be made to insure access, physical and virtual, should not be made, but
not to the extremes and high cost their advocates want. Sort of like the
disruptive use of a signer at every event, regardless of who is attending.
While there have been, no doubt, some
extreme cases of very costly accommodations being demanded, most of the
necessary changes only require companies and universities to keep accessibility
in mind as the product is designed. Why
we can’t all agree to that escapes me entirely.
Last Week’s Trivia
Challenge
Last week’s topic was flags. Lance Crimm (ECET), a flag lover from way back, got all five right!
1. What is the
greatest number of stripes that the US flag has had? 15
2. Which state flag
looks almost the same upside down, leading to it often being hung incorrectly? Several acceptable answers. The
best are Tennessee (whose flag was upside down on a US postage stamp), and
Maryland.
3. What national flag
is solid green in color? Libya
4. Which state flag
contains the British Union Jack? Hawaii
5. What is the only
national flag that is square in shape? Switzerland
(and, Lance informs, Vatican City).
This Week’s Trivia
Contest
There isn’t one. The contest will return in the New Year. Happy Holidays to all!