In a couple of weeks, California State University system faculty — over 26,000 of them — are preparing to strike for five days. This infographic does a nice job of explaining why; the short version is that CSU faculty are not being paid as much as their peers (alarmingly, most […]
A Muslim teenager who made an electronic clock by hand was arrested this week under suspicion of terrorism. National Geographic was purchased by media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Public broadcasting television show Sesame Street partnered with premium cable channel HBO. And meanwhile, every week there’s another “I quit” story from someone leaving academia, citing […]
Maybe you’ve always know you’ve wanted to be a research professor in wildlife ecology. Perhaps you’ve just taken a course on fungi and stumbled into a whole new world of career possibilities. Either way, getting past the first step– your undergraduate degree– and onto the academic path isn’t easy. Academic culture isn’t […]
Happy Ada Lovelace Day! Today, we honor women in science, technology, engineering, and math, in the hopes of increasing visibility and diversity in the STEM fields. This year, Ada Lovelace Day lands in the beginning of the Donors Choose Science Bloggers for Students Challenge, where science bloggers raise funds to […]
This is a quick update to say: I defend my dissertation tomorrow! I have a lot of thoughts about this, most of which I am unable to articulate because I am literally eating, breathing, and dreaming my dissertation, which means I’m finding it difficult to articulate anything that isn’t about […]
As a young undergraduate, I remember researching my first term papers and take-home exams, flexing my new-found research skills to find the absolute best references. At first, I equated “best” with “newest.” This wasn’t necessarily a product of my training; my undergraduate advisor teaches ecology from Foundations of Ecology, which […]
Can you imagine studying cells without a microscope? Or not having goggles and aprons to practice safe science in the classroom? It’s no surprise in this economy that, faced with budget cuts, teachers have to pay more and more for basic classroom supplies or students go without. Cue Donors Choose, […]
A few things have gotten me thinking a lot lately about math anxiety among science students. First, I drafted my first teaching statement, which got me thinking seriously about pedagogy, classroom diversity, and the legacies of students taught in No Child Left Behind-era classrooms. Secondly, I’ve guest lectured and graded […]
The Contemplative Mammoth 