Back in 2007 I made some pretty significant predictions. I would like to say that making predictions is not nearly as hard as you would think. The way technology is adapted is pretty straight forward. So to recap this is…
Category: Academic Life
From a professor’s perspective, academic life refers to the professional and personal experiences associated with working in the field of academia. Here are some key aspects:
Teaching: Professors are responsible for imparting knowledge to students through lectures, seminars, and other educational activities. This involves preparing course materials, conducting assessments, and mentoring students.
Research: Academic life often involves engaging in research activities. Professors contribute to the body of knowledge in their field through scholarly research, publishing papers, and attending conferences. Research can be individual or collaborative.
Advising and Mentoring: Professors play a crucial role in advising and mentoring students. They guide students in their academic and career pursuits, providing support, advice, and expertise.
Administrative Duties: Professors may take on administrative responsibilities within their academic institution. This can include serving on committees, participating in decision-making processes, and contributing to the overall governance of the institution.
Professional Development: Continuous learning and professional development are integral to academic life. Professors often engage in staying updated on the latest developments in their field, attending workshops, and pursuing further education.
Networking: Building and maintaining professional relationships with colleagues, students, and professionals in the field is important. Networking can lead to collaboration, research opportunities, and a broader impact in the academic community.
Balancing Work and Personal Life: Academic life can be demanding, and finding a balance between work and personal life is crucial for a professor’s well-being. Managing time effectively becomes essential to meet teaching, research, and other responsibilities.
Publishing and Scholarly Activities: Professors are typically expected to contribute to the academic literature by publishing research findings, books, and articles. Scholarly activities are key to establishing reputation and credibility in their field.
Service to the Community: Professors may engage in community service related to their expertise. This could involve outreach programs, public lectures, or collaborations with local organizations.
Tenure and Career Advancement: For those in the tenure-track, academic life involves working towards achieving tenure and advancing in their career. This often requires a combination of excellent teaching, impactful research, and service contributions.
North West Indiana: Ice Storm December 2009
Here are some pictures from last night. The snow that fell was soon covered by a half inch of ice. That left areas like the park looking like an ice-rink. To say the footing and driving is treacherous would be…
Cloud Computing: Presentation by students
The students of ITS 470 Large Scale High Performance Systems created a cloud operating system. This presentation will give you a good over view of the topic. I won’t comment on the student with the horrible British accent. I won’t…
Cloud computing: An open source networked operating system
Cloud computing is a developing section of high performance computing. High performance computing includes many facets such as availability, processing, and reliability. In this project the facet of reliability is examined. Increasing the number of machines is one way to…
Academia
“In academia there is no reason for two adversaries to take the field where one triumphs at the expense of the other. Rather in education, scholarship transcends winning and losing, by fostering learning” – anonymous
How Completing a PhD is like Running an Ultra Marathon
A couple of thing you should know about me. First, I am in the process of completing my PhD and second, I have recently taken up running. I began both of these pursuits reluctantly. I began my PhD course work…
The distance education paradigm: A dalliance with success
What is the value of a university? The building and land have value. The resources and materials for research are often expensive and even priceless. The trade and product of a university is the talent and intellectual capital that is…
Lift 2007: Sugata Mitra shows how kids teach themselves
Sugata Mitra from India using a window in a wall tests with extensive rigor the idea of whether children can teach themselves with educational technology. This strikes at the heart of our standard thoughts on how education, pedagogy and learning…
TED: Liz Coleman’s call to reinvent liberal arts education
This is an interesting if dry discussion on the current state of higher education and how liberal arts have devolved from generalized concepts to ultra specialization. At Purdue University Calumet a group of professors have tried to bring civic minded…
Review: How to talk about books you haven’t read by Pierre Bayard
Sometimes a book comes along that just by the title you have to read. In a rather thin book you find between the hard covers a discussion of the love of reading. The different ideas of how to read. Though…
Review: The Paideia Proposal by Mortimer Adler
This book as part of the movement that doesn’t appear to have gotten off the ground is an influential to me short story of what education could become. The book is fairly old so we can see how little effect…
Review: Blackfoot is missing by William Owen
This book is a work of fiction looking at the special operations forces working in Northern Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos near the end of the war. The author provides and excellent view into the fictional world of these actors with…
Review: Securing SCADA systems by Ronald Krutz
The author Ronald Krutz takes the reader through the various elements of cyber security as it is applied to SCADA systems. Documenting the various protocols and issues in depth the author mentions some very specific threats to cyber security that…
Review: Cyberpower and National Security edited by Franklin Kramer et. al.
“Cyberpower and National Security” edited by Fraklin D. Kramer, Stuart H. Starr, and Larry K. Wentz is a deep dive book into the substantive literature and ideas of the interaction between cyberspace, conflict, people, politics, and the diplomacy of deciding…
The Web 2.0 Bomb
It slices, dices, mixes, mashes, julienne fries, stirs and when you’re done lights venture capital cash on fire while creating social earthquakes. It is Web 2.0 the term used to describe social media. The new best thing in tech, half…