The Physics and Astronomy colloquium this week was by Jill Linz from Skidmore, talking about a couple of physics outreach programs she’s worked on. This being right up my alley, I made it a point to get in early enough to see the colloquium (I spent the morning at home with the sick SteelyKid, and… Continue reading Falling Into Atomville
Month: January 2009
links for 2009-01-23
Steven Chu Addresses the National Labs | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine "The new Secretary of Energy, Steven Chu, addressed the national labs in an all-hands video transmission today. I was not there, but my colleague and friend Rob Roser at Fermilab was there, and sent me a very nice bulleted summary. " (tags: science… Continue reading links for 2009-01-23
The Prestige for Ytterbium: Quantum Teleportation with Separated Atoms
My graduate alma mater made some news this week, with a new quantum teleportation experiment in which they “teleport” the state of one ytterbium ion to another ytterbium ion about a meter away. That may not sound like much, but it’s the first time anybody has done this with ions in two completely separate traps,… Continue reading The Prestige for Ytterbium: Quantum Teleportation with Separated Atoms
Academic Poll Results: Classroom Atmosphere
Here are the results of yesterday’s poll, as of about 10pm Eastern. Blue bars are the fraction of respondents saying that a given behavior (wearing hats, eating in class, drinking in class, leaving class to go to the bathroom) was acceptable, red bars the fraction saying it was unacceptable: You can also see the results… Continue reading Academic Poll Results: Classroom Atmosphere
The Joys of Day Care
SteelyKid is now in day care five days a week. This is good for us, in that it lets Kate and I both go back to work full-time, and good for her, in that she gets to meet new people, and spend the whole day playing with interesting toys. Of course, it has its bad… Continue reading The Joys of Day Care
links for 2009-01-22
Legoland California’s depiction of Barack Obama’s inauguration | World news | guardian.co.uk (tags: politics news silly pictures toys) Let My Students Drink: College presidents say it’s time to lower the drinking age – Reason Magazine "Q: Why lower the drinking age? A: Weâve had a law on the books for 24 years now. You donât… Continue reading links for 2009-01-22
Academic Poll: Classroom Atmosphere
I went to a panel discussion yesterday about teaching issues, and was struck by both the strength and the range of opinions regarding classroom atmosphere. Some people are very laissez-faire about what students can do in class, while others have very strict codes of classroom behavior. One colleague even referred to a “code of professional… Continue reading Academic Poll: Classroom Atmosphere
Buddhists Are Citizens Too
Lots of people are giving Obama props for the shout-out to atheists in his inaugural address, but I’m deeply concerned about what he said. Or, rather, what he didn’t say: We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers. Where are the Buddhists? He left out a major world religion!… Continue reading Buddhists Are Citizens Too
Point Spreads, Again
I’m listening to “Mike and Mike” on ESPN radio, as I usually do in the morning, and they just spent the better part of five minutes talking about the point spread for the upcoming Super Bowl. The opening betting line has Pittsburgh favored by seven points, but some Las Vegas organization or another told them… Continue reading Point Spreads, Again
links for 2009-01-21
Phys. Rev. ST Phys. Educ. Res. 5 (2009): Lauren E. Kost, Steven J. Pollock, and Noah D. Finkelstein – Characterizing the gender gap… "Binned by quintiles, we observe that males and females with similar pretest scores do not have significantly different post-test scores (p>0.2) . The post-test data are then modeled using two regression models… Continue reading links for 2009-01-21