the waiter
/A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person. -Dave Barry
ideas that challenge / comfort / inspire
Articles of interest about higher ed - Oct 23
/***HIGHER ED & THE VIRUS
US colleges that welcomed students back likely led to a surge in Covid cases
UNC-Asheville Police Officer Dies of Covid-19
***THE VIRUS AT SPECIFIC SCHOOLS
COVID outbreak sends St. John Fisher College fully remote
Testing reveals over 6% of Carroll College students have COVID
1 in 6 Clemson U. Students Test Positive for Covid-19
***K-12
Student’s ‘Homosexuality is a sin’ shirt didn’t violate dress code, Tennessee suit says
Experts Warn Students May Face Challenges When In-Person Classes Resume
Boston Public Schools switching to all remote-learning due to rising COVID-19 numbers
***COLLEGE FINANCES
Higher Education’s Big Shake-Up Is Underway
Pandemic Boosts Fundraising at Community Colleges
$100 Million Gift for California's Community Colleges
***HIGHER ED
Occidental College to end football program
***LIBERAL ARTS
Will the Humanities Survive? ($)
Undervaluing the arts and humanities: where did it go wrong? (opinion)
***ONLINE CLASSES
Why education technology can’t save remote learning
University of Iowa professors, students adjust to new formats of online testing
***ONLINE CHEATING
An Exam Surveillance Company Is Trying to Silence Critics With Lawsuits
Students Cheat. How Much Does It Matter? ($)
What AI College Exam Proctors Are Really Teaching Our Kids
Rutgers faculty discusses cheating during remote instruction
An ed-tech specialist spoke out about remote testing software — and now he’s being sued
***ACADEMIC LIFE
How a Mild-Mannered USC Professor Accidentally Ignited Academia’s Latest Culture War
Pitt law school adjunct professor resigns after using a racial slur in class
Pitt law school adjunct professor resigns after using a racial slur in class
***ADMINISTRATORS
University President Dies After Contracting COVID-19
Former Okla. President and VP Will Not Be Charged in Sexual Misconduct Case involving students
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGES
Evangelical Colleges Are Handling COVID-19 Much Like Their Secular Counterparts
Former theology school administrators in Columbus charged with conspiracy, financial aid fraud
Santee Christian College to Pay $225,000 Over Federal Violations on Recruiting
Christian Colleges Will Survive, but Change Is Coming
Liberty University launches website to report misconduct under Jerry Falwell Jr.'s tenure
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGE TUITION
Houghton College to slash tuition in half for 2021
Three Evangelical Colleges Cut Tuition Prices
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGES & POLITICS
Christian College Faculty Aren't Lining Up for Trump
Teaching Politics at Belmont Has Me Worried About the State of Debate
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGE RESIGNATIONS
Southwest Baptist University president resigns
Houghton College president to retire in 2021
Gordon College president is stepping down
***MOODY BIBLE
Moody Bible head responds to Title IX claims, sex abuse mishandling
Lesbian student says Moody Bible Institute threatened her for tweeting about sexuality
***RESEARCH
The Perils of Publication and Citation Bias
Quotation errors in general science journals
***RETRACTIONS
The bizarre anti-vaccine paper a Florida professor has been trying to have retracted to no avail
***STUDENT LIFE
Report: 28% of College Students Come From Immigrant Families
College counselors innovate to help students with financial aid applications
Fewer Pell Grant recipients enrolled in private nonprofit colleges this fall
US Tycoon Who Pledged Millions For Black Students Admits Tax Fraud
RI federal judge dismisses student lawsuit but laments “ American democracy is in peril’
***STUDENTS & COVID
Student lawsuits against universities demanding COVID-19 refunds pile up
College journalists report from their quarantined campuses
***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT
How the University of Michigan failed to heed warnings about doctor's alleged sex abuse
University of Utah and family of Lauren McCluskey reach $13.5M settlement
***CRIME ON CAMPUS
No charges for former University of Utah officer who showed explicit photos of Lauren McCluskey
Articles of interest about religion - Oct 22
/***RELIGION & THE VIRUS
Ventilation and air filtration play a key role in preventing the spread of COVID-19 indoors
Data shows clusters of COVID cases linked to church services in North Carolina
Leader of evangelical school in California addresses outbreak in video
***RELIGION AND POLITICS
The Evangelical Movement’s Bad Bargain (opinion)
Billy Graham's granddaughter urges evangelicals not to support Trump
White Christians still favor Trump over Biden, but support has slipped
Michigan billboard campaign contrasts Trump’s words against Jesus’
How Christian nationalism may determine whether you wear a mask
Faith leaders back Biden in sign that evangelical support for Trump is waning
Trump looks to evangelical Latinos for boost in Florida
***DENOMINATIONS
First-ever survey of race, sexuality and gender identity of Episcopal clergy is underway
Episcopal Church worship attendance down by nearly 25% since 2009
***CATHOLIC
Priest says someone called police about a homeless person, but it was a statue of Jesus
Pope calls for civil unions for same-sex couples, in major departure from Vatican doctrine
Pope removes Polish bishop accused of sex abuse cover-up
Computer Whiz Who Died In 2006 Could Become 1st Millennial Saint
Major U.S. diocese files for bankruptcy after 200 sexual abuse lawsuits
***MEGACHURCHES
Megachurch pastor John Hagee tests positive for COVID-19
Megachurch Pastor Greg Laurie Tests Positive for Covid-19
***RELIGION & SCIENCE
Elsevier journal disavows, but does not retract, paper on intelligent design
***RELIGION IN COURT
LifeWay inks out-of-court agreement with former CEO Thom Rainer
Private school sues Oregon over in-person learning restrictions
Christian Group’s cost-sharing Insurance Plan Called a Fraud by state of New York
Case dismissed of former Chattanooga pastor suing his church for $4 million
***RELIGIOUS CELEBRITIES
Died: Luci Swindoll, Who Believed in God’s Grace and Being Herself
exploring the world
/People who are not busy exploring the world are busy building their egos. –Arvinder Kang
real learning
/In the early 1980s, two physicists at Arizona State University wanted to know whether a typical introductory physics course, with its traditional emphasis on Newton’s laws of motion, changed the way students thought about motion.
They gave the test to people entering the classes of four different physics professor, all good teachers, according to both colleagues and their students.
Did the course change student thinking? Not really. After the term was over, the two physicists gave their examination once more and discovered that the course had made comparatively small changes in the way students thought. Even many “A” students continued to think like Aristotle rather than like Newton. They had memorized formulae and learned to plug the right numbers into them, but they did not change their basic conceptions. Instead, they had interpreted everything they heard about motion in terms of the intuitive framework they had brought with them to the course.
The conducted individual interviews with some of the people who continued to reject Newton’s perspectives to see if they could dissuade them from their misguided assumptions. The students performed all kinds of mental gymnastics to avoid confronting and revising the fundamental underlying principles that guided their understanding of the physical universe.
Those physics students who made A’s yet failed to grasp anything about Newtonian concepts had not rebuilt their mental models about motion. They had merely learned to plug numbers into formulae without experiencing an expectation failure with the universes they imagined in their minds. They took all they heard from their professors and simply wrapped it around some pre-existing model of how motion works.
Perhaps because they were focused on grades rather than on understanding the physical universe, they didn’t care enough to grapple with their own ideas and build new paradigms of reality.
Ken Bain, What the Best Teachers Do
it doesn't last
/People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing -- that's why we recommend it daily. -Zig Ziglar
the strongest political bias of all
/The strongest bias in American politics is not a liberal bias or a conservative bias; it is a confirmation bias, or the urge to believe only things that confirm what you already believe to be true. Not only do we tend to seek out and remember information that reaffirms what we already believe, but there is also a “backfire effect,” which sees people doubling down on their beliefs after being presented with evidence that contradicts them. So, where do we go from here? There’s no simple answer, but the only way people will start rejecting falsehoods being fed to them is by confronting uncomfortable truths.
Emma Roller writing in the New York Times
Recent data science articles - Oct 16
/Why reducing the costs of training neural networks remains a challenge
Data poisoning—a series of attacks targeting machine learning and deep learning models
Machine learning with less than one example
Defending the defense industrial base from ransomware
80-year-old man pulls driver from sinking car
/#GOODNEWS
Articles of interest about journalism, writing, fakes, & social media - Oct 16
/***THE VIRUS
A Global Data Effort Probes Whether Covid Causes Diabetes
When COVID-19 superspreaders are talking, where you sit in the room matters
This company is giving away bacon-scented face masks
Study: COVID-19 transmission risk on airplanes 'virtually non-existent' when passengers wear masks
***JOURNALISM
Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s record on press rights issues
Most in US say anonymous sources in news are OK only in special cases
***JOURNALISM & THE ELECTION
National News Outlets Prepare for an Election Night that Might Turn into Days, Weeks
How Not to Cover Voter Fraud Disinformation
How The Associated Press Plans to Report The Election Results
***WRITING & READING
People Are Recommending Books For People Who Haven't Read Since High School, And it is Wonderful
Your Local Bookstore Wants You to Know That It’s Struggling
Reading C. S. Lewis in the Time of Covid
***FAKES & FRAUDS
How to Deal With a Crisis of Misinformation ($)
“It’s been really, really bad”: How Latinx voters are being targeted by disinformation
Podcast discussion of a paper titled the online competition between pro- and anti-vaccination views
***QANON
YouTube bans QAnon, other conspiracy content that targets individuals
QAnon is tearing families apart ($)
How the "QAnon Candidate" Marjorie Taylor Greene Reached the Doorstep of Congress
Conspiracy Theories, Such As QAnon, Appear To Gain Ground In Britain
How a dangerous virtual cult is going global
***SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook says it will finally ban anti-vaccination ads
64% of Americans say social media have a mostly negative effect on the way things are going
TikTok passes Instagram as second-most popular social app for U.S. teens
'Freedom of speech is no longer free.' Ohio man says he was fired over a TikTok video
***PRIVACY & SECURITY
Google is adding cross-app account security alerts on iOS
DuckDuckGo, EFF, and others just launched privacy settings for the whole internet
Gmail users: Expect to see these new security alerts, says Google
Google is adding cross-app account security alerts on iOS
***LANGUAGE
The origin of Nicaraguan Sign Language tells us a lot about language creation
The pandemic is changing the English language
In Language Learning, Mistakes Are Not Bad
In many Asian languages, 'LGBTQ' doesn't translate—here's how some fill the gaps
***POETRY
The Future of Poetry in 10 Poems ($)
Louise Glück, American poet, wins Nobel Prize in Literature 2020
Kendrick Lamar’s Poetic Awakening
The Gift of Blindness and Poetry
The New York Times project on Young Black Poets ($)
***PRODUCING MEDIA
Prezi introduces dynamic video teaching tools as education moves online
Apple iMovie vs Adobe Premiere Elements
Be careful
/A man can't be too careful in the choice of his enemies. -Oscar Wilde (born Oct. 16, 1854)Chick-fil-A employee saves choking child in drive-thru
/#GOODNEWS
Zack Kokenzie (known as Cowboy to his friends) heard a child choking while he was working the Chick-Fil-A drive-thru in Columbus, Georgia. The Eagle Scout jumped into action and helped free the child from a seat belt that was wrapped around the child's windpipe. (Click on the picture to read more)
Articles of Interest about higher ed - Oct 15
/***HIGHER ED & THE VIRUS
Pandemic presents an opportunity for small liberal arts colleges to change
List of employees with COVID-19 at Volunteer State Community College emailed by mistake
How Transparent Is Your College's COVID Dashboard?
***K-12
Schools are 2 months into reopening under Covid-19 and no one's keeping track of how it's going
Up to 1 million California students may still lack connectivity during distance learning
***LAYOFFS & FURLOUGHS
University of Memphis braces for layoffs as COVID-19 takes its toll
D'Youville College to lay off employees furloughed since spring
Ithaca College to cut 130 faculty positions due to low enrollment
Duke University to lay off 75 employees due to COVID-19 disruptions
***COLLEGE FINANCES
Cornish College of the Arts Declares Financial Emergency and Exigency
***HIGHER ED
University of Florida ends use of prison labor after mounting student pressure
Texas A&M shortens spring break to a single day
Colleges cancel diversity programs in response to Trump order
***HIGHER ED IN COURT
Princeton will pay nearly $1M in back pay to female professors in sweeping discrimination settlement
***HUMANITIES
Colleges are dropping courses in humanities
***ONLINE CLASSES
Coursera Founder Launches Zoom Challenger For Higher Ed
A college student says a professor told her not to breastfeed her baby during online class
Fine Arts majors say they struggle with online and distance learning
***ONLINE CHEATING
150 University of Missouri students caught cheating on exams held online amid COVID-19
More Mizzou students are cheating — and you can blame the pandemic. Sort of
California bar exam takers say facial recognition software rejected them
***ACADEMIC LIFE
Professors endure a summer of cancellations: recent assaults on academic freedom
Harvard professor Charles Lieber sues university over legal fees
***ADMINISTRATORS
Notre Dame president ends quarantine after COVID diagnosis
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGES
Ohio Wesleyan cuts 18 majors, consolidates departments to save $4 million
Facebook bans Liberty University's Falkirk Center co-founder
Former Student Claims Moody Bible Institute Put Her on ‘Warning Status' for Being Lesbian
Moody Bible Institute Must Face Sex Discrimination, Retaliation Lawsuit ($)
***CHRISTIAN COLLEGES & COVID
Notre Dame’s President Faces an Angry Campus After Getting the Coronavirus ($)
Baylor suspends football activities due to COVID issues
Point Loma Nazarene University reports jump in COVID-19 cases
***SEMINARIES
Court Dismisses LGBT Anti-Discrimination Lawsuit Against Fuller Seminary
SBC seminary votes to retain slaveholders’ names on buildings
***RESEARCH
Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?
How One Prominent Journal Went Very Wrong ($)
Journals’ English copy-editing services are inadequate and unethical ($)
Publish, profit, predate, perish and peer review
Retraction Watch on The Data Skeptic podcast
***STUDENT LIFE
College kids get creative to get out the vote
A college refuses to accommodate students who are afraid of being on campus
On college campuses, resident assistants in dorms adjust to a new role: COVID cop
Students continue to be stressed about college, their futures
Latinx DACA Students Contend with Adversity at Universities
***STUDENTS IN COURT
College baseball, racial epithets, and free speech
***RACIAL ISSUES ON CAMPUS
Duquesne University fires professor who used racial slur in class
***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT
U.S. Department of Education fines Baylor $462K for violations of Jeanne Clery Act
LSU releases new regulations addressing sexual harassment under Title IX
Why Is It So Hard to Fire a Tenured Sexual Predator? ($)
The path to holiness
/The path to holiness lies through questioning everything. –M. Scott Peck
Motivated reasoning
/Motivated reasoning is thinking through a topic with the aim, conscious or unconscious, of reaching a particular kind of conclusion. In a football game, we see the fouls committed by the other team but overlook the sins of our own side. We are more likely to notice what we want to notice. Experts are not immune to motivated reasoning. Under some circumstances their expertise can even become a disadvantage.
People with deeper expertise are better equipped to spot deception, but if they fall into the trap of motivated reasoning, they are able to muster more reasons to believe whatever they really wish to believe.
Tim Harford, How to Make the World Add Up
Optimists
/Optimists are nostalgic about the future.
Once I reach my goal, then I’ll be happy
/The implicit assumption behind any goal is this: “Once I reach my goal, then I’ll be happy.” The problem with a goals-first mentality is that you’re continually putting happiness off until the next milestone.
Furthermore, goals create an “either-or” conflict: either you achieve your goal and are successful or you fail and you are a disappointment. You mentally box yourself into a narrow version of happiness. This is misguided. It is unlikely that your actual path through life will match the exact journey you had in mind when you set out.
James Clear, Atomic Habits
feeling inferior
/No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. -Eleanor Roosevelt, born: Oct. 11, 1884
Strict Materialism
/If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brian, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true.. and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.
JBS Haldane, Possible Worlds