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“I don’t go to many of these kinds of
things.
This one was well worth my
time.” - Robert Breuder
President, College of DuPage
2013 Nine Shift: Higher Education in the 21st Century
Strategic Planning seminar in Ft. Lauderdale
The 2014 event will be Feb 6-7, 2014.
Email Tammy at info@lern.org for info.
Why Young Women Don’t Go Into STEM Explained
Julie Coates reported on her own
original research explaining why women do not go into or stay in STEM
professions. Some 75% of women drop out
of STEM professions, according to research reported in The Chronicle of Higher
Education, as compared to only 25% of males.
Coates said that women in more
economically prosperous and democratic nations such as the U.S. go into STEM
less than in less developed and less democratic societies. Having the choice,
women tend to favor professions where they perceive they can make a direct
difference in people’s lives, she noted. She also reported an ASQ survey just
out noting that women tend to take fewer risks than men, with risk taking more
essential in STEM professions.
Coates said that intervention programs
such as STEM camps for girls and other programs, on which hundreds of millions
of dollars have been spent, have no impact on young women’s choices.
Coates said schools and colleges
should adhere to Title IX and stop giving males worse grades than females. This
gender bias keeps out 2 million smart males a year from college, causing the
STEM crisis.
Julie speaking at the seminar.
Big news early in 2013 is that the
transformation of higher education moved into a new phase in early 2013.
I reported this at our third annual Nine Shift: Higher Education in the 21st century strategic planning seminar for senior administrators in colleges. Here's my coverage of myself:
“We are now out of the debate phase
from 2008-2012 about whether we have a problem. Everyone now clearly
understands higher ed has to be transformed,” he noted.
The new phase is a trial and error
phase where new ideas will be tested, with many hits-and-misses Draves
stated. MOOCs, for-profits such as
Coursera and Khan Academy, Mozilla badges, and corporate assessment are all
fads that will be tested in this phase, Draves predicted.
He also said many pilot programs will
become permanent and part of a new model of higher education, including flex
time, extended time, prior learning experience, testing outs, and new grading.
Draves said the next phase, which will
likely begin around 2016, will be a phase where several new models of higher
education are created, with the selection of the new model for higher education
occurring in just six years, in 2020.
Faculty want their male students to be more like their female students. But even they can't do it. Faculty also exhibit the same hard wired gender characteristics as their students.
We did the numbers. For one of my most recent online courses for faculty, faculty were asked to take online quizzes until they passed at the 80% level. I counted how many times the average male faculty member did our four quizes. It was 6. For the average female faculty member, it was 11 times.
Males tend to reach the 'pass' rate and then stop. When they know something, they move. Females however try for perfection. So even though the female faculty members got to 80% just as quickly as their male counterparts, they kept taking the quizzes trying to get 100%.
This is why females spend (I say "waste") 30% more time studying than males, yet males and females both learn the same amount. It's also one reason why teachers give males worse grades, because when males have learned something they tend to move on, thus spending 30% less time studying while learning just as much. Photo: senior administrators from colleges at our Nine Shift seminar last week in Ft. Lauderdale.
Will people living alone move into collaborative housing?
I remember my mother's two aunts living with her, her father and her brother after my grandmother died. I remember my other grandmother's sister living with family. I don't remember a single person living alone in my extended family.
But people started living alone in greater numbers in the 1920s, congregating in Greenwich Village in New York because of the closeness and small apartments. By the 1930s, Sweden had begun building a cooperative living building with common living and dining areas for single people.
Yet 80 years on, most single people still live alone. Dense communities will help, and maybe be the answer. With Gen X pioneering more common areas in apartment buildings, maybe they will lead us into a 'community family.' Your thoughts?
Will lonliness and less family contact be a feature of the 21st Century?
Every century has its downsides. This century will be better than the last. But recently someone attending the big NineShift annual presentation questioned why I was not more supportive of strengthening families. Well, I certainly am. I just don't know how.
I know people living alone is increasing. I know many older people who want more visits from their children. I remember my mother always asking if I could stay longer. And me always feeling guilty driving out of her driveway. Is there a solution, or is lonlineness and living alone just a feature of this century?
Snow Family. Kids down the block making a snow family this week. These first two snow people are their parents.
From the State of the Union last week:
Image courtesy of Midwest High Speed Rail.
The kids on Reddit had a blast with the photo and news that someone had stolen a train in Sweden and rammed into a house. Here's some of their comments:
* I'm assuming they underestimated the size of the living room.
* If only the homeowners had a train to defend themselves with, this never would have happened.
With that said, I believe that everyone should be able to drive trains whenever they want to.
* What's the purpose of stealing a train, it's not like you could hide it.
REPLY: It is possible to get away if you hide the tracks.
ANOTHER RESPONSE: Yeah, that's how I pictured it all going down.
No one's buying electric cars. Yet car makers are sticking with them. Why?
Fascinating juxaposition of two articles in The New York Times Wed Jan 16 on page 2 of Business section. One about the declining car market in Europe, with Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Chrysler and Fiat, saying "There has to be a day of reckoning. No industry can continue to fund losses of this magnitude."
Then there's the story about GM and Tesla and Nissan remaining committed to electric cars.
Take our pre-graded quiz on why:
a.Automakers really care about the environment. WRONG
b.The average car buyer, now over 55, really cares about the environment WRONG
c.The average pick up truck buyer, the biggest sales volume product, really....... WRONG
d.This is the last ditch hope for getting Gen Y to buy cars. CORRECT
Here's one necessary way to increase college graduation rates. Ban teachers from speaking ill of students and young people.
I teach faculty. From my classes, I estimate 15% of teachers openly speak ill of students and young people.
Two problems with that: 1) there's nothing wrong with students and young people today. 2) The big problem is that it inhibits learning, completion and success.
Can you imagine pilots coming on the loud speaker and calling their passengers wimps for the minor turbulence? What if doctors went on the radio and called their patients unworthy of their cure?
Students get the message they are bad. Other teachers are negatively affected. We know success is motivated by positive encouragement and lessened by discouragement. We know students can learn more if they are told they are smart.
Ban teachers from speaking ill of students and young people. It's one of the new recommendations for Enabling Learning and Completion, a new chapter in the forthcoming Fourth Edition of Advanced Teaching Online. It's also overdue.
