A Scout Report: ABT (Ballet), Bunraku, Nate Silver, Cuba in Revolution and The Search for Extraterrestial Life
Research and Education
Cover of MISSION: MARS, a children's book by SETI Institute scientist Pascal Lee; Photo credit Scholastic
·https://seti.berkeley.edu
The SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute at UC Berkeley searches for "electromagnetic signatures of intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations, spanning wavelengths from radio to visible light, over ten orders of magnitude in characteristic time scale." Readers can explore the goings-on at SETI on this website. For instance, the SETI Projects tab provides descriptions of the six main projects the organization is currently running. The Great Debate is another great area, featuring a video of a public debate between renowned SETI scientist, Dan Werthimer, and skeptic, Geoff Marcy. Each side presents evidence for why we should - or shouldn't - believe that there really are other advanced civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy.
Innovations for Successful Societies
Successful Societies ·http://successfulsocieties.princeton.edu
Innovations for Successful Societies at Princeton University has been chronicling government innovation in low- and middle-income countries since 2008. The basic idea is that development and reform efforts succeed when they take into account the cultures, conditions, histories, and geographies of the diverse populations that they seek to serve. On this site, readers may want to start with the excellent five-minute introductory video, which can be located under the About tab. From there, readers can scout the homepage, where they may peruse the 12 Focus Areas, browse the Latest Publications, and both read and listen to the Latest Interviews with development experts who are working "in the trenches." The site can be especially helpful to teachers of later high school and early college, as well as anyone with an interest in current critiques of international development work.
·http://www.aaaopenanthro.org
Open Anthropology is the first digital-only, public journal of the American Anthropological Association. Each issue focuses on a "timely theme" and gathers anthropology articles, past and present, related to it. For instance, the October 2014 issue is titled, "World on the Move: Migration Stories." Articles on the theme include a 1920 missive by the famed ethnologist Franz Boas, groundbreaking work about "How People Moved Among Ancient Societies" (2013), and a "Narrative of an Asylum Seeker" (2004), just to name a few. Each issue is offered free of charge, with an insightful Editor's Note that describes the topic and the current articles.
·http://theseedcenter.org
This joint effort between the American Association of Community Colleges and ecoAmerica seeks to build and further develop clean energy technology and sustainability programs at community colleges around the country. With over 470 community colleges already participating, the program has real traction. There are troves of information on this site about Solar, Wind, Green Building, Energy Efficiency, Sustainability Education, and much more. Each category boasts curricular materials, professional development resources, employment industry projections, and other great information and tools. Also of interest, are the Featured Resources (located within the Resource Center), offering information about various SEED related opportunities for educators and workforce development professionals.
·http://www.bnl.gov/science/physics.php
The Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) studies some important and perplexing questions: What is dark energy? Can we use wind to power whole cities? How do the smallest biological structures interact with one another? Physics of the Universe, the BNL's web page dedicated to the institution's physics experiments, is particularly fascinating. Readers may explore the page via three "frontiers:" the Energy Frontier, which delves into work at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland; the Intensity Frontier, which explains data gathered at the Daya Bay Neutrino Experiment in China; and the Cosmology Frontier, which gives an overview of some of the work being done at the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope in Chile. Physics Research News covers projects and bios, particularly those related to women doing research at Brookhaven.
·http://www.uah.edu/prc
There is a reason why the magazine Popular Science cited the Propulsion Research Center at the University of Alabama in Huntsville as one of the coolest student labs in the country. For one thing, they get to launch rockets. They also have state of the art research facilities and contracts with a number of private industries. Browse the About section to read the fascinating history of the lab, including the government organizations and aerospace industries that students get to collaborate with. Then check out News for videos of Methane Ignition, Schlieren Nozzles, and other wonders.
Windows to the Universe: The Sun
·http://www.windows2universe.org/sun/sun.html
Created by NESTA, the National Earth Sciences Teachers Association, Windows to the Universe provides a wealth of resources for teaching and learning the geosciences. In addition to basic facts about the sun, the Culture section leads to information on myths, artwork, and beliefs about the sun from a wide variety of cultures, including Aztec, Norse, Inuit, African, and Greek and Roman. The site design is in need of some upgrading, and there are ads — for products and services of interest to the education community — however, teachers can become educator members, for a small yearly fee, to get the ad-free version of the site. Despite its 1990s look, educators will find plenty here to put to use in their classrooms.
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