A posting at Inside Higher Ed has noted that:

In recent years, as federal agencies have shifted the grant application process online, Mac users have complained about being treated as second class citizens. This year, as the National Institutes of Health shifted its process to the Grants.gov online submission system, glitches have further frustrated Mac-wielding scientists. Grants.gov is an outgrowth of the President’s Management Agenda that seeks to have all federal grants exclusively online.

Many academic scientists [have] said that the government didn’t know its audience when it began with a Windows-only system — and changes have not gone as well as many have hoped. While Mac users may be in a minority nationally, there are parts of academe where their numbers are far from small.

read more

The Chronical of Education posted a note today describing how Wikipedia's founder, Jimmy Wales, says that he wants to get the message out to college students letting them know that they shouldn’t use Wiki either for class projects or for serious research. Speaking at a conference held at the University of Pennsylvania on Friday called “The Hyperlinked Society,” Mr. Wales said that he gets a number of e-mails each week from students who complain that Wikipedia has gotten them into academic trouble. However, he said that he has no sympathy for their misfortune, noting that he thinks to himself: “For God sake, you’re in college; don’t cite the [Wiki] encyclopedia.”

read more

Undoubtedly, students often pick which college to attend based upon who’s got the best football team or which is the best party school. Enter the influence of MMORPG. Now students can pick their college based upon which one has the most World of Warcraft players. Dr. B. will be glad to see that Purdue made #6.

At Inside Higher Ed, Rob Franciosi cites the problems of being always on via email. Not any big news here, although his piece and the subsequent comments do hit all the major issues and potential solutions. Good story about the student who submitted pictures of his burning car by email to provide evidence of why he would need to miss class:

Terry is a grad student at my university who drives 130 miles each week from Interlochen Arts Camp to Grand Rapids for a night class. One Monday he e-mailed that a car problem might result in his absence the next day. Attached to his text was a series of numbered digital photographs taken just hours before: No. 127, his car, smoking alongside the highway; No. 128, from 20 yards further back, the burning car, flames engulfing the left side; No. 142, a firefighter, gazing at the blackened shell; and No. 143, in a creative denouement, the burned-out car being hoisted by a wrecker.

read more

Looks like more profs are getting fedup with students using laptops in their classrooms. It’s the usual suspects–students are abusing classtime to gamble in online casinos, plan keggers over IM, and take so many notes that they…er…Don’t listen? (I don’t know much about stenographers, but apparently they ain’t too bright.) I guess I can symphathize with Intern Travis here. After all, if a prof is okay with my bringing in an inflatable child’s wading pool, filling it full of frat punch and getting s-faced during his PowerPoint, then I can’t imagine what the heck his problem is with just finishing a few levels in WoW. I mean, it’s not like we’re using hair dryers in the bathtub or anything. Geez, profs be so uptight sometimes.

read more

I just watched Voices from the New American Schoolhouse trailer at YouTube after hearing about it at Boing Boing. The clip concerns a radial experiment in education taking place in Fairhaven. It’s a school where kids (of all ages) make the rules and decide what they want to learn and when.

Of course, I’ve heard about projects like this before, and we can find parallels in the history of universities (such as those of Bologna). Somehow, though, I’m skeptical. If I were 12 and allowed to “make my own lesson plan,” it would consist entirely of videogames and the occasional SF flick.

I just watched Voices from the New American Schoolhouse trailer at YouTube after hearing about it at Boing Boing. The clip concerns a radial experiment in education taking place in Fairhaven. It’s a school where kids (of all ages) make the rules and decide what they want to learn and when.

Of course, I’ve heard about projects like this before, and we can find parallels in the history of universities (such as those of Bologna). Somehow, though, I’m skeptical. If I were 12 and allowed to “make my own lesson plan,” it would consist entirely of videogames and the occasional SF flick.

read more

Well, looks like everyone’s second favorite social software is opening its pages to people who, like aren’t in school anymore. Seems like the Facebook crew is getting restless and looking to expand beyond the tower. Just think–pretty soon facebook junkies could get their fix in their cubicle, reliving those glory days of facebooking in the computer classroom (like OMG, why can’t that stupid prof buzz off??). And this will no doubt spur productivity. Oops–sorry, I’m shaky. Been ten minutes since I last facebooked. If you want your name written in the facebook of life, you gotta stay active and try to get random people to be friends with you and stuff.

Well, looks like everyone’s second favorite social software is opening its pages to people who, like aren’t in school anymore. Seems like the Facebook crew is getting restless and looking to expand beyond the tower. Just think–pretty soon facebook junkies could get their fix in their cubicle, reliving those glory days of facebooking in the computer classroom (like OMG, why can’t that stupid prof buzz off??). And this will no doubt spur productivity. Oops–sorry, I’m shaky. Been ten minutes since I last facebooked. If you want your name written in the facebook of life, you gotta stay active and try to get random people to be friends with you and stuff.

read more

The Georgia Tech Library is running the following notice

Because of recent problems with systematic downloading of IEEE and ASCE journal articles that resulted in the suspension of our access, the Library has implemented downloading limits. We will continue to monitor this situation. Please note that downloading entire collections of data or entire issues of a journal or conference is a violation of copyright law and a violation of Georgia Tech’s licenses with publishers.

Yet another reason why we need open content. Subscription prices are rising at a rapid pace. Every university I’ve been at has sent out “surveys” to find out which journals we “really” need because costs are outstripping budgets. Now we get “downloading limits” with no specifics about those limits. What if I’m interested in an entire special issue? Do these “downloading limits” mean I can only see one article per day? Per week? Per month? Soon to come, printing limits, time limits on how long one can read an article–already in use via NetLibrary, and perhaps even citation limits. Digital collections are great, but not when they come with high prices and restrictions. It appears the Georgia Tech Library is only borrowing the journals.

The Georgia Tech Library is running the following notice

Because of recent problems with systematic downloading of IEEE and ASCE journal articles that resulted in the suspension of our access, the Library has implemented downloading limits. We will continue to monitor this situation. Please note that downloading entire collections of data or entire issues of a journal or conference is a violation of copyright law and a violation of Georgia Tech’s licenses with publishers.

Yet another reason why we need open content. Subscription prices are rising at a rapid pace. Every university I’ve been at has sent out “surveys” to find out which journals we “really” need because costs are outstripping budgets. Now we get “downloading limits” with no specifics about those limits. What if I’m interested in an entire special issue? Do these “downloading limits” mean I can only see one article per day? Per week? Per month? Soon to come, printing limits, time limits on how long one can read an article–already in use via NetLibrary, and perhaps even citation limits. Digital collections are great, but not when they come with high prices and restrictions. It appears the Georgia Tech Library is only borrowing the journals.

read more

I’ve noticed that my web site has recently had a number of visitors living in South Carolina. As a small thank-you to them, I’m posting eight pictures, many of which are of one of my favorite things in South Carolina, the “Old Main” building on the campus of Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina. (For pictures, go to actual website listed at the end of this commentary).

The first two are logo-type images. The third picture is of an oil painting of “Old Main.” The fourth image is an etching of The Main Building (Old Main) on Wofford College’s campus in Spartanburg, SC. The fifth is from a rare postcard (I think from the early 1900s), and the following two are recherche, campus landscape daguerotypes, again from the early 1900s or before. The last is an image of the very first diploma awarded by the college.

Deadline: May 10, 2006

Kairos, A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy is pleased to announce the Kairos Awards for Graduate Students and Adjuncts, sponsored by Bedford/St. Martin’s Press. (These awards were formerly titled the Kairos/Lore Awards for TAs and Adjuncts.)

Graduate students and adjuncts often face institutional constraints that undervalue the work they do. For many, their service, scholarship, and teaching often do not translate into simple acknowledgment, let alone higher pay, more travel funds, and better working conditions. These awards serve to ameliorate some of those conditions through recognition and compensation.