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One would think that an economist who teaches math, including one math class that teaches the statistical program SPSS, would be very knowledgeable about how computers work. Alas, that is not actually the case. While I use computer programs to do my research, and write SAS and Fortran programs to do so, the actual workings of the computers that I depend on are still quite a mystery to me. My father was an electrical engineer, and therefore had more of a sense of how these mysterious boxes turned what are basically “on” and “off” switches into the tools that make my life possible. I, however, went to college in the final years before the personal computer became a fixture in our homes, and had very little education as to how they work. Much of my early research was done on mainframes (either locally or remotely), and I still find myself with a sense of ignorance about personal computers.

If the root cause of our sustainability problem set (not just climate change, but neither excluding climate change) is societal behavior patterns and the habits of thought that facilitate them, then there's no institution better positioned than higher ed to address the problem. Yet, for practical purposes, we seem not to be doing so in any significant manner. Most of the sustainability-related research of which I'm aware focuses on metrics ("how bad is the problem this week?"), mechanics ("how do these two elements of the problem seem to interact?") or technology ("how can we continue to do -- as much as possible -- what we've been doing, while decreasing the negative unintended consequences?"). The researchers, almost without exception, consider themselves to be seriously engaging with the problems at hand. And, within the conventional mindset, they are. But it's the conventional mindset that got us into this mess.

We don't need adaptive learning because we already have something better, adaptive teaching.

Tomorrow American University's Washington College of Law, Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property, inaugurates the Cherry Blossoms Conference on Federal Intellectual Property Policy: Accessibility, Copyright and New Technologies.

A left coast correspondent writes: "I have been trying to get my foot in the door in CC's in southern California for a year now. I must've called a dozen or more schools, applied through the online systems, and informally sent my CV and cover letters to the chairs and vice chairs of several departments. While I am still trying, I am also applying to full-time jobs. I've read that CC experience is a must--that I must have experience teaching the CC student body."

My current fascination is the nature of online reading communities, which I hope will be the subject of my next sabbatical, assuming my proposal is accepted. So the sale of Goodreads to Amazon is naturally fascinating to me.

An embedded startup consists of a dedicated team working on a new business within a larger organization. The dedicated team is formed in a conscious effort to avoid mimicking the culture, organizational structure, norms, and assumptions of the larger organization.

As I was cleaning out the refrigerator the other day, I was reminded of Arlie Hochschild’s The Second Shift, which describes the extra burden of work that falls to women once they are at home. Then, it occurred to me that, because I was cleaning out the office refrigerator (who leaves vanilla frosting and a stick of margarine in a communal refrigerator anyway?), this work was a part of my first shift, even though it appears nowhere in my job description. This made me wonder whether women face not only extra work at home but also hidden tasks throughout their workday.