The first real failure of a MOOC course has drawn a lot of criticism - but the truth of the story will only serve to strengthen this new form of education. Here is why;
1. These are new and we are just learning how to use them and learn from them.
2. In the engineering world failure is the most important step of learning
3. The people involved are resilient and will learn from this failure.
If you need some proof - simply Google the term "importance of failure" - failure is not the opposite of success, it is simply a step the increases the stature of eventual success for those willing to learn the lessons it teaches.
And it really is that simple....
Wednesday, February 06, 2013
Monday, January 28, 2013
Coursera Experience
I am currently taking 3 courses from Coursera (one of
which I am wrapping up this week) and have completed another 3.
1. These courses are incredibly well done - better than
nearly any courses I took as an undergrad.
2. They are also very challenging, if anyone wants to
take a look at the derivations I had to perform for Astronomy (and yes they
have software that can grade mathematical derivations) I'd be happy to show
them (or simply come to the online course improvement meeting Tuesday).
This will have a major global impact, there really is no
debate. Here is some anecdotal information from one course (Astronomy). I have
corresponded a lot on the bulletin board with 2 students, Σταύρος A.
Αθανασιάδης - a student from Greece who is taking 6 courses and has this as his
only real access to education and Khadija Niazi who is taking about 10 other
courses - all advanced science courses (Astrophysics, Molecular Biology,
Organic Chemistry). Now here is the kicker - Khadija is 12 and she is brilliant
- her questions and analysis are better than nearly anything I have seen from
any of my undergraduates..
I have learned a lot from the courses I have taken. Now I
must go and determine in X | Y = y has an expected value of X that is the same
as the expected value of X when Y is also random (doing my Data Analysis
homework).
Saturday, December 08, 2012
Running and the Nature of God
I am often asked what I think about when I go on lon runs, and my usual response is "nothing" - which is completely untrue. The truth, though would lead to a much more involved discussion - so the lie is much easier. I feel compelled to write some of these thoughts, and this blog is a nice medium for that. The only problem is that this goes in chronological order - and the thoughts actually evolve in forward, but oh well.
Lately I have thought a lot about the nature of God - and being very steeped in science, I try to resolve science fact with religion. I start with a simple premise like "God is Everywhere" and work this out in my head. Using that as a starting point, I then jump to the nature of mass (not as in church, but the scientific definition). We are discovering that not everything in the universe has mass. Mass is simply another property, and I hesitate to say of matter, because that in itself implies mass. But if we free God having mass, we also free God of the physics constraints of objects that have mass. This now give God some abilities to allow God to be everywhere. (Notice I avoid using him/her to describe this God - as the true nature is way beyond describing in terms of human perception). First is time. Get rid of mass and theoretically you can exist everywhere in time simultaneously - that in itself is pretty powerful. I arrived at this conclusion through a lot of thought exercises - but used "massless" as the starting point.
The ability to move through time (or exist in all times) has some disturbing repercussions, one of which is it make everything predetermined. I don't believe that everything is predetermined, so it follows that there also must be multiple realities (possibly infinite) to create the "free will" and the cause/effect relationship of free will.
I'm going to leave this post hanging on these thoughts, there is a lot more I hope to explore in the future such as; what is math (not what we all think), the concept of infinity (which I seem to have a grasp on now) and a lot of others.
So if next time you ask e what I am thinking - I give you the short answer - please don't be offended.
Lately I have thought a lot about the nature of God - and being very steeped in science, I try to resolve science fact with religion. I start with a simple premise like "God is Everywhere" and work this out in my head. Using that as a starting point, I then jump to the nature of mass (not as in church, but the scientific definition). We are discovering that not everything in the universe has mass. Mass is simply another property, and I hesitate to say of matter, because that in itself implies mass. But if we free God having mass, we also free God of the physics constraints of objects that have mass. This now give God some abilities to allow God to be everywhere. (Notice I avoid using him/her to describe this God - as the true nature is way beyond describing in terms of human perception). First is time. Get rid of mass and theoretically you can exist everywhere in time simultaneously - that in itself is pretty powerful. I arrived at this conclusion through a lot of thought exercises - but used "massless" as the starting point.
The ability to move through time (or exist in all times) has some disturbing repercussions, one of which is it make everything predetermined. I don't believe that everything is predetermined, so it follows that there also must be multiple realities (possibly infinite) to create the "free will" and the cause/effect relationship of free will.
I'm going to leave this post hanging on these thoughts, there is a lot more I hope to explore in the future such as; what is math (not what we all think), the concept of infinity (which I seem to have a grasp on now) and a lot of others.
So if next time you ask e what I am thinking - I give you the short answer - please don't be offended.
Friday, October 05, 2012
Resurrecting Blog
It has been 5 years since I posted to this blog, while at the same time keeping many other activities going. However - I do find that I have very useful things to say, and would like to keep at least some of my thoughts to look back on (at least by me). So expect more in the future (and I am changing the horrid background).
Friday, July 24, 2009
Interesting Times and Program Eliminations
Well for those local people who watch the news - by now you know that the Engineering Technology Department has been discontinued. The final decision was made yesterday July 23 at the BOT meeting. Ironically that morning a news report stated that students wishing to find a job and make a good wage should either
1. Go to an Ivy League School
2. Go to a Technical College.
3. If you go to a state University be sure to major in something that requires a lot of math.
Anyway - I made my statement, did a few news interviews and headed over to Wackadoo's to have a drink with my colleagues. Here is the BOT statement I made;
While we are disappointed by the cancellation of the Engineering Technology program within the University of Central Florida, the faculty of the ENT department have been pleased at the number of opportunities that have arisen as a consequence of this decision. I have personally reviewed potential options available to the department, and gone over these options with the department faculty.
At this time we feel that a full move of the Department to Daytona State College is the best course of action to meet the needs of our students and faculty. We are actively assisting Daytona State College administration in seeking state approval for the program. We are requesting that the Board of Trustees, University Administration, and College Administration assist us in what ways that they can in making this transition successful.
At all times during this difficult period we must first and foremost take into consideration the needs of the over 500 Engineering Technology students, all juniors and seniors that are being displaced by the cancellation of programs in the department.
For all of those who follow this saga - this is a good place for me to give you the news from my perspective.
1. Go to an Ivy League School
2. Go to a Technical College.
3. If you go to a state University be sure to major in something that requires a lot of math.
Anyway - I made my statement, did a few news interviews and headed over to Wackadoo's to have a drink with my colleagues. Here is the BOT statement I made;
While we are disappointed by the cancellation of the Engineering Technology program within the University of Central Florida, the faculty of the ENT department have been pleased at the number of opportunities that have arisen as a consequence of this decision. I have personally reviewed potential options available to the department, and gone over these options with the department faculty.
At this time we feel that a full move of the Department to Daytona State College is the best course of action to meet the needs of our students and faculty. We are actively assisting Daytona State College administration in seeking state approval for the program. We are requesting that the Board of Trustees, University Administration, and College Administration assist us in what ways that they can in making this transition successful.
At all times during this difficult period we must first and foremost take into consideration the needs of the over 500 Engineering Technology students, all juniors and seniors that are being displaced by the cancellation of programs in the department.
For all of those who follow this saga - this is a good place for me to give you the news from my perspective.
Monday, June 29, 2009
Technology Changing Me?
Since I asked my students in CET 6933 to blog about technology has affected them, I find it only fair to reciprocate. Here is my article about how technology has changed the way I do things.
If I had to pick one technology that has had the greatest affect on my day ot day life - it would have to be email. I still recall as a graduate students getting my first email account. The concept of being able to write a message on the computer and sending it someone at the time was quite novel. As long as the other person had an email address you could communicate almost instantly - a great improvement over the status quo.
Now we flash forward 20 years to today. My normal work routine has me checking my email as the first thing I do in the morning (if there are no early morning meetings). I've avoided the temptation of being connected 24/7 - I still limit my email time to set times of day; morning, after lunch, prior to leaving work, and after dinner. If I miss one of these - I don't fret, any message that is that important will warrant a call to my cell phone. SO what do I do on email? I arrange meetings, read FYI's, respond to student questions, pass along documents, and pretty much all the things everybody else does. This part of life (email) has become pervasive and is my preferred form of communication.
Since I receive and send so many emails, I needed a better way to organize them. Because I typically remember who sent me a mail, I realized that filing them by Sender made a lot of sense. Now my email cabinet has the folder "By Sender" and under that each letter of the Alphabet "A", "B", "C", and so on.... And in each of these folders all those senders. My "S" folder along has 71 sub-folders for every sender with a last name ending in "S". Does this work? I can typically find any mail that I want in seconds based on this scheme. But that brings up another question - which is where did I learn how to do this type of organization? Since there is no class required of all students in "How to Manage Data" - I had to come up with a workable scheme on my own. (There used to be a class in filing at most Universities, though I never took it).
This all leads to my final point. Knowledge and communication advances in technology have chenged the life of nearly everybody - most of all our students. We, however, do not prepare them for this new world. In fact, the opposite is true - they teach us ways and tools to better manage information and communicate. I count myself lucky in that, as I aged, I never adopted the annoying habit of "shunning" advances and closing myself off to them. However, as professional educators we should take a different viewpoint. We should be at the forefront of using advances and passing them on to our students - teaching them ways to better use the huge amassed amount of knowledge and data that are out there and readily available. If it looks like I learn and teach at the same time, passing on insite from students to other students - give yourself an A for being perceptive.
If I had to pick one technology that has had the greatest affect on my day ot day life - it would have to be email. I still recall as a graduate students getting my first email account. The concept of being able to write a message on the computer and sending it someone at the time was quite novel. As long as the other person had an email address you could communicate almost instantly - a great improvement over the status quo.
Now we flash forward 20 years to today. My normal work routine has me checking my email as the first thing I do in the morning (if there are no early morning meetings). I've avoided the temptation of being connected 24/7 - I still limit my email time to set times of day; morning, after lunch, prior to leaving work, and after dinner. If I miss one of these - I don't fret, any message that is that important will warrant a call to my cell phone. SO what do I do on email? I arrange meetings, read FYI's, respond to student questions, pass along documents, and pretty much all the things everybody else does. This part of life (email) has become pervasive and is my preferred form of communication.
Since I receive and send so many emails, I needed a better way to organize them. Because I typically remember who sent me a mail, I realized that filing them by Sender made a lot of sense. Now my email cabinet has the folder "By Sender" and under that each letter of the Alphabet "A", "B", "C", and so on.... And in each of these folders all those senders. My "S" folder along has 71 sub-folders for every sender with a last name ending in "S". Does this work? I can typically find any mail that I want in seconds based on this scheme. But that brings up another question - which is where did I learn how to do this type of organization? Since there is no class required of all students in "How to Manage Data" - I had to come up with a workable scheme on my own. (There used to be a class in filing at most Universities, though I never took it).
This all leads to my final point. Knowledge and communication advances in technology have chenged the life of nearly everybody - most of all our students. We, however, do not prepare them for this new world. In fact, the opposite is true - they teach us ways and tools to better manage information and communicate. I count myself lucky in that, as I aged, I never adopted the annoying habit of "shunning" advances and closing myself off to them. However, as professional educators we should take a different viewpoint. We should be at the forefront of using advances and passing them on to our students - teaching them ways to better use the huge amassed amount of knowledge and data that are out there and readily available. If it looks like I learn and teach at the same time, passing on insite from students to other students - give yourself an A for being perceptive.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Web 3.0
As part of my job as a faculty member and supposed technology "guru" I both track new technologies, and also consult on how to capitalize on technology advances. Right now there is plenty of speculation about Web 3.0. The current term "Web 2.0" describes the conversion of web technologies to allow facilitate communication and social networking. So what will Web 3.0 be?
I'll cut right to the chase - Web 3.0 is all about a custom experience for the individual. Right now the web does have a level of personalization - I personally consider the tools and gadgets that I use from iGoogle a very convenient personalization. But to understand Web 3.0 I will need to fast forward you into the future.
At 6 AM your computer wakes you up and reminds you that you asked it to remind you that you wanted to go for a run this morning. Since your first morning meeting is 9 AM, it has determined that you can get in 4-5 miles before showering and have time for breakfast and work. It has preloaded music on your iPod based on your preferences and what you listened too on previous workouts. After your run and shower, the computer goes over your daily schedule and to-do list so you will be ready for the day. It also suggests to schedule a lunch meeting with a client and after your OK contacts the client to get a confirmation. It will get back to you as soon as it gets confirmation - and lets you know.
The latest news based entirely on your interests have been loaded into your car system so that you can listen on the way to work. While you drive, and listen - the car informs you on an incoming call to confirm your lunch meeting and suggests a location (which you confirm). As you arrive at work you realize that need to grant access to one of your friends into your house. Your work computer informs your home system to allow the person into the house based on a positive facial recognition.
I can easily continue this - but the concept is simple. Web 3.0 is all about 2 concepts - customization and convenience. Over the next 10 years this technology will converge to allow you to customize the services you use - and most people will use this ability to add a level of convenenience to their lives.
I'll cut right to the chase - Web 3.0 is all about a custom experience for the individual. Right now the web does have a level of personalization - I personally consider the tools and gadgets that I use from iGoogle a very convenient personalization. But to understand Web 3.0 I will need to fast forward you into the future.
At 6 AM your computer wakes you up and reminds you that you asked it to remind you that you wanted to go for a run this morning. Since your first morning meeting is 9 AM, it has determined that you can get in 4-5 miles before showering and have time for breakfast and work. It has preloaded music on your iPod based on your preferences and what you listened too on previous workouts. After your run and shower, the computer goes over your daily schedule and to-do list so you will be ready for the day. It also suggests to schedule a lunch meeting with a client and after your OK contacts the client to get a confirmation. It will get back to you as soon as it gets confirmation - and lets you know.
The latest news based entirely on your interests have been loaded into your car system so that you can listen on the way to work. While you drive, and listen - the car informs you on an incoming call to confirm your lunch meeting and suggests a location (which you confirm). As you arrive at work you realize that need to grant access to one of your friends into your house. Your work computer informs your home system to allow the person into the house based on a positive facial recognition.
I can easily continue this - but the concept is simple. Web 3.0 is all about 2 concepts - customization and convenience. Over the next 10 years this technology will converge to allow you to customize the services you use - and most people will use this ability to add a level of convenenience to their lives.
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