When Teachers Eat Their Own

I had my first instance of teachers starting to cannibalize those about to be laid off in the wake of our Governator's lame and incredibly harmful 10% across the board budget cuts for education. These cuts are going to make already strapped schools have to make really hard choices on how to do them when there's no more to be trimmed away and the schools are already running as absolutely lean as possible.

And the education budget cuts are short term savings with really serious long term effects. A less educated populance is less able to compete on the global market, a less educated populance is more prone to drug abuse, violence, crime and depression. A less educated populance is less of an asset and more of a liability.

But I digress, there's nobody that actually thinks the budget cuts are a good idea and I think Schwarzenegger is a big meat-headed coward for attacking education.

But it isn't anything I can do anything about so I'm trying not to let it get to me although I will miss a few teachers and support staff next year when they are unable to get a new contract.

And it is these portending layoffs that have sparked this post. I had a teacher, one I spent two or three day upgrading and improving their classroom computer not more than a month ago, ask me if she could get a new computer. When I asked what she meant, she elaborated by saying that, if some of the teachers and support staff being laid off have a better and newer computer than hers, then she'd like first crack at getting one.

It isn't hard to understand and accept really. Its the nature of business and education. Layoffs spark a feeding frenzy for cube goodies, computers, chairs and more. But any layoffs are months away and it kind of felt like the buzzards have started circling before the explorer lost in the desert has even run out of water or tumbled to the ground.

Also, I had to gently bring the smackdown on someone in our district offices that was emailing the entire technology department with her computer problems. The first time she did it I expected someone more senior to give her a little education but they apparently did not. The second time, I emailed her and asked her to not email the entire department and also gave her instructions on how to log a Help ticket to get a tech automatically assigned to her problem. There is a pretty shocking lack of understanding of how to put technology to good use in the school system and the number of people who are aware of the resources they have available.

Play With This!

Check out PicLens and load up an image search and have fun sweeping along a wall of images, browsing to stop and look at just one for a moment before sweeping further along.

You can do Google and Yahoo image searches, Flickr and others too. It is mesmerizing and a fantastic way to explore.

In chatting about it with a teacher today, I had the idea of a Flickr search sorted by date for Burning Man to start at the beginning and go all the way through to the end. I'm sure the search would have to be narrowed down some as it's likely a rather large pool of photos. But its a cool idea.

I suppose it would even be possible to set it up to show photos live with a camera with a wireless card on board. How sweet would that be? Photos appearing on a wall of photos in near real-time of the event you're at? I loves the tech!

And I'm going to build a little demo slideshow now. Be back in a few, I hope.

Projects

Today I get to start the install on one of my pet projects that's aimed at showcasing technology's utility to the teachers at one of my schools. To that end, we're putting in an installation of Imacs along with a digital projector (which does some pretty nifty stuff) and want to try and encourage greater tech adoption at the school since many teachers see computers as an necessary evil and not a really incredibly useful tool for communication and learning.

I hope I'm not moving these computers in a torrential downpour though, that could complicate things a bit.

One really nice benefit to working at three different schools is that I can mix and match technology across the three schools to make the most of what I do have available. For instance, one school had a pretty serious lack of mice, one school had a bunch extra (like a shopping bag full) so I grabbed some and brought them over, trading the mice for some USB keyboards that were needed at my other school.

And I can also use my other schools for ideas, projects and partnerships.

The project I'll be working on today is, more or less, a copy of a set up at one of my other schools. But if it can spark a little interest in using technology in the classroom then it'll be well worth the effort. Because I firmly believe that the more tech-savvy a kid is moving forward, the better equiped they'll be to be able to develop marketable skills.

Damn, looks like one of my three Imacs is not quite ready for primetime. Time to get out the hammer and re-educate it.

The Hot and Cool Science of Thermoacoustics

In this month's Popular Science there's a story about a very interesting and potentially world changing stove being developed called SCORE (Stove for Cooking, Refrigeration and Electricity).

By using thermoacoustics, the stove heats pressurized air on one side of a pipe, water keeps the other side cool and the collision of the two different temperature air masses produces sound that drives a wire coil in and out, kind of like a loudspeaker but in reverse, that creates electricity. Water running over the coldest part of the tube freezes into ice which can be used to keep a fridge cold.

How wacky is that? Make a fire to keep something cold. Who says science doesn't have a sense of humor.

The potential applications for this technology are almost limitless and could deliver safer food storage, cleaner air, more efficient resource usage and better lives for a rather insanely large portion of the world's population. And that, my friends, would really and truly make the world a better place.

Read more about it at Huliq

It Would Help If Our Politicians Knew What Teh Intarnets Were

U.S. loses top spot in global tech study.

Not just the top spot but we are now seventh. Singapore and Denmark, Sweden and Finland and Switzerland and the Netherlands are all beating us at information exploitation and communications tech.

But Thierry Geiger, one of the Forum's economists responsible for the 361-page report, said the U.S. market environment remains the best in the world in terms of how easy it is to set up a business, get loans and have access to market capital.

So that's nice. But.

The index...cited the United States' low rate of mobile telephone usage, a lack of government leadership in information technology and the low quality of math and science education.

The lack of government leadership in info tech is understandable given our politicians shocking "understanding" of what the internet is and what it represents. The low quality of math and science education in the country is also understandable given the faith-based agenda that has dominated almost every aspect of Bush's administration.

Also, I bet Arkansas is bringing down the national average.