The Gender and Creativity Gap in STEM

The gender gap in STEM fields has been a common theme for many years, both in conversations about the future of STEM disciplines as well as in funding opportunities for STEM research. In a recent Chronicle article, Theodore Hill and Erika Rogers suggest that looking into the connection between creativity and math may serve as a bridge across the female-STEM chasm.
Read more here.
http://chronicle.com/article/For-Women-to-Think/131547/

The use of creativity and other engaging techniques to deal with student motivation has been proposed for a number of underrepresented groups in various fields. Let me hear about your experiences in using these engaging techniques and how you think it impacts student motivation and student learning.

Is your Science Repli-capable?

In a recent Chronicle blog post, Tom Bartlett gives an account of an attempt to replicate ALL studies published within a one-year time span in select major psychology journals. The goal is to determine the extent to which studies in psychology can be replicated. If you think this is a problem just for psychology, read the article.

http://chronicle.com/blogs/percolator/is-psychology-about-to-come-undone/

Me.edu - Personalizing Education

Given that institutions of Higher Education are challenged by a number of forces, many institutions have turned to data mining on various sources of student data to maximize success and efficiency. A recent Chronicle blog post highlights this movement toward vast data mining and the personalizing of the educational experience.

http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/me-edu-debating-the-coming-personalization-of-higher-ed

I am interested in hearing your thoughts about the article. What can be gained from collecting vast amounts of data from students (about student performance and otherwise, say from facebook or pinterest) and using that data to personalize the experiences for students.

Participate in a Global Dialogue on Sustainability, and Democracy

Please see the message below from Community-Campus Partnerships for Health.

To participate in the Global Dialogue, visit Go to PERARES Debate at http://bit.ly/HdKMuF  Click on all debates and find Big Tent Discussion on Sustainability, Knowledge and Democracy - the discussion opens on April 24th, 2012 and continues until 6 pm Central European time on May 11th, 2012.

Community-Campus Partnerships for Health participates in the Global Alliance for Community-Engaged Research, established in 2008 to "facilitate the sharing of knowledge and information across continents and countries to enable interaction and collaboration to further the application and impact of community-based research for a sustainable just future for the people of the world" (see: http://bit.ly/HQqf3f )

The Global Alliance participates in a group of international networks (known as the Big Tent group) working on community-university research and engagement issues.

On September 23, 2010, the Big Tent group released the first Global Communique on the Enhancement of North-South Cooperation in Community University Engagement (see: http://bit.ly/HQrkYB)  On October 8, 2011, the Big Tent Group  released the second global dialogue communique on A Scenario for Community-University Engagement in 2030 (see:http://bit.ly/Ifwn11)

Big Tent III will offer suggestions for how universities and communities can work together to make the transition to a sustainable world. As with the earlier communiques, this statement will be open source and will be owned by all who participate with the rights to re-distribute and share within all networks.

Theme of Big Tent III: The Questions

According to many, the technological potential for a transformation towards a sustainable society is available.  Business and financing models for the transition exist, and the political instruments needed for a climate-friendly transformation are known. In the interest of moving the forward, we need more interaction between politics, society, science and the economy. Can we move from the slow lane to the fast lane?

1. How can Community University Research and Engagement Partnerships contribute to environmentally sustainable economic and social development in the transformation of our societies?

2. How can knowledge and education be drivers of the transformation process?

To participate in the Global Dialogue, visit Go to PERARES Debate at http://bit.ly/HdKMuF  Click on all debates and find Big Tent Discussion on Sustainability, Knowledge and Democracy - the discussion opens on April 24th, 2012 and continues until 6 pm Central European time on May 11th, 2012.

Annual Promotion and Tenure Panel

Dear Colleagues,
Join us for the annual Promotion and Tenure Panel discussion.

Promotion & Tenure Panel

Thursday, April  19, 2012
3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Building (58W), Room 3806

Register to drichard@unf.edu

Please join faculty from across the campus for the annual Promotion and Tenure Panel discussion. Dr. Mark Workman, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, along with faculty and representatives from a variety of units and perspectives, will discuss the criteria for the awarding of promotion and tenure and will address the many factors that are involved in successfully navigating the tenure and promotion process. Assistant, Associate, and new faculty members are especially encouraged to attend.

Register to drichard@unf.edu

Think Like a Start-up

In a recent paper, Brian Mathews, Associate Dean for Learning and Outreach at Virginia Tech, outlines some suggestions for librarians in how to re-imagine library services. I think he presents lessons for many of us. Could Higher Education think like a start-up? Could you think like a start-up for your courses?
Post a comment. I would like to hear your reaction.
http://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/bitstream/handle/10919/18649/Think%20like%20a%20STARTUP.pdf?sequence=1

Income Inequality, Trust, and Academic Dishonesty

Is the growing problems with cheating in US colleges and universities related to economics? In a recent article, psychologists have observed a link between economic inequality in a state and the amount of cheating in that state (measured by the number of Google searches for "buy term papers" and national pay-for-paper websites). They suggest that the way to reduce academic dishonesty is to build trust between teachers and students, students and students, and within society as a whole. Read the summary of the research on the Association for Psychological Science website.
http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/news/releases/income-inequality-and-distrust-foster-academic-dishonesty.html