It started when someone asked Dr. B. for advice about starting a Ph.D. program with three kids in tow. Since then, the question has been bouncing around the academic blogosphere, with posts you should read at Academom and Geeky Mom. Although this is absolutely the worst time in the semester for me to fire on all cyliders with this one, regular readers know that I’ve shared my own experiences in this area, so I can’t stay completely out of it.
A brief recap of the current conversation:
Category Archives: Social issues
Delta Airlines and another dangerous liquid.
The liquid in question, of course, is breastmilk.
As reported by the Burlington Free Press:
A finding in need of an explanation
On the way home, I heard a story on NPR about a study done at UC Berkeley about the “performance gap” between black kids and white kids in the public schools. I can’t say much about the details of the report — it comes out tomorrow — but one of the people interviewed for the story, Ross Wiener of The Education Trust, noted a finding in this general area of research that screams out for an explanation.
The finding: while white students tend to lose ground during summer vacation (at least with respect to the sorts of performance easily measured with standardized tests and similar assessment methods, one assumes), black kids actually gain ground over the summer. (The text in the webpage for the NPR story says “minority kids lose less ground when they are away from school”, but listen to the sound file linked at the top of that page — Wiener really does say they gain ground.)
So, what could explain this unequal benefit from summer vacation? (For bonus points, how would you test the potential explanations?) And, is this a finding that will play any role at all in the decisions of districts considering eliminating summer vacation in favor of year-round instruction?
What’s your legislative agenda for the first hundred days?
The 110th Congress has been elected. Whether it’s the crowd you voted for or not, there’s quite a lot of talk now about a new direction, a new civility, possibly even a new pony (but I might not have heard that last part right).
So, given that the Congresspersons will be looking for our votes again in another two years (along with a third of the Senators), this seems like a good time for the people (i.e., you all) to put together an agenda for these elected representatives of ours. To streamline things a bit, and in keeping with the overarching themes of this weblog, let’s restrict the wish-list, at least for the moment, to issues to do with science, education, and matters of ethics — broadly construed. It would be good if you could provide a brief description of why your agenda item should be a priority, and whose needs or wants it will serve. If you’ve got a clever plan for funding it, so much the better.
If we can hammer out some good science/education/ethics goals for the legislative branch, I’m prepared to launch a letter-writing campaign to communicate them to the legislators, and a Congress-watch to keep track of how well they do at achieving these goals.
Seems to me that they ought to care what we want even after they’ve gotten our votes. Let’s make sure they know what that is — and that we’ll be watching!
“Science” kits that teach stereotypes.
It’s the time of year when the mailbox starts filling up with catalogues. At the Free-Ride house, many of these are catalogues featuring “educational” toys and games. Now, some of these toys and games are actually pretty cool. Others, to my mind, are worse than mere wastes of money.
For your consideration, three “science” kits targeted at girls:
Making real changes in the landscape of science.
I want to commend to you a pair of posts that strike me as calls to action. Both relate to the oft-discussed “pipeline problem” in the sciences. And, I take it that both authors are interested in making science (and especially academic science) a less hostile environment not just for women, but for others who love science but, frankly, may not have much patience for current institutional or societal barriers to entry to the tribe of science.
A brief list of reasons I’m against capital punishment.
Because Shelley asked (and Josh, Mike, Chad, Nick, PZ, and John have all posted answers), I’m going to chime in.
Shelley asks:
Are you for or against the death penalty, or (if it’s conditional), in what cases? Furthermore, do you believe that societies that sanction war are hypocritical for opposing the death penalty?
Rather than giving a detailed argument in favor of my position on capital punishment, I’m just going to enumerate my reasons. Then, I’ll see if I can say something sensible on what this ought to mean for my position on war.