tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44106216621367150822009-07-12T21:37:49.758-04:00Welcome to the Boles University Blog!Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.comBlogger128125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-75620387022762100172009-06-29T08:12:00.000-04:002009-06-29T08:12:23.255-04:00

Cornell University is in trouble. A laptop was stolen containing 22,546 social security numbers of students -- half were alumni -- and 22,731 social security numbers for faculty and staff, including 4,284 retirees. The files on the computer containing the names and social security numbers were not encrypted and the laptop was left in a physically unsecure environment, which violates University

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-49498341257261321852009-06-05T13:01:00.000-04:002009-06-05T13:01:26.285-04:00

Noah Wardrip-Fruin poses a fascinating question on his blog: Is peer review enough of a catchall against prejudice and misinformation; or can adding blog readers to the process also help expand the understanding of the author: The blog-based review project started when Doug Sery, my editor at the MIT Press, brought up the question of who would peer-review the Expressive Processing manuscript. I

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-46003732023937930362009-05-15T09:37:00.000-04:002009-05-15T09:37:49.524-04:00

Standford's "Office Hours" on Facebook begs of being just a bit too cute for the room: Stanford University is bringing office hours to Facebook by spotlighting world-class faculty on its Stanford University Facebook profile (http://facebook.com/stanford). At most universities, instructors set aside a few hours each week for students to drop by for conversation. Stanford Open Office Hours is a

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-250513395615918692009-05-08T08:59:00.000-04:002009-05-08T08:59:19.359-04:00

We support the idea of dropping letter grades at the university level and implementing a universal grading system of "Pass" and "No Pass." Letter grades have become meaningless and students are terrified of getting anything less than an "A" on any project.  In fact, many students are of the mind that just by showing up for class they should be rewarded with an "A" grade when doing the bare

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-44271148587527260372009-05-01T10:43:00.000-04:002009-05-01T10:43:49.490-04:00

Is the university system broken? Do we care more about making money than mending minds? Are students interested in learning or in just finishing a program of study? Is the mandate of the university now to just award degrees instead of contributing to the intellectual goodness of the world? When did the university become a meme for commerce instead of a place for communion and fellowship?

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-39952073310672845222009-04-24T12:47:00.000-04:002009-04-24T12:47:39.314-04:00

We love the whole idea behind TurnItIn.com as a necessary intellectual watchdog against student plagiarism and intellectual falsity and the news this week that, despite student protest, TurnItIn.com does not violate a student's Copyright. A federal appeals court granted a boost to fair use advocates Friday when it ruled that an online cheating-detection service storing thousands of student essays

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-972352208359596132009-04-17T14:09:00.000-04:002009-04-17T14:09:09.994-04:00

We knew it was coming: Social Networking makes us stupider; and the current culprit is Facebook. Facebook user GPAs were in the 3.0 to 3.5 range on average, compared to 3.5 to 4.0 for non-users. Facebook users also studied anywhere from one to five hours per week, compared to non-users who studied 11 to 15 or more hours per week.We use Facebook -- not to study or to learn -- but to socialize

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-12510373127805650232009-04-03T09:38:00.000-04:002009-04-03T09:38:31.677-04:00

We are reminded of the early, heady, days of the internet when university campuses were just beginning to provide WiFi access to the school network instead of requiring a tethered Ethernet cable. Students, of course, abused the new wireless freedom by bringing their laptops to class and surfing the internet when they should've been taking notes. One Ivy League professor, fed up with the

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-76339021760161880942009-03-13T09:50:00.000-04:002009-03-13T09:50:00.425-04:00

The Harvard Media Cloud is a fascinating project funded by the Harvard University Berkman Center for Internet & Society: Media Cloud is a system that lets you see the flow of the media. The Internet is fundamentally altering the way that news is produced and distributed, but there are few comprehensive approaches to understanding the nature of these changes. Media Cloud automatically builds an

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-91078338405196652082009-03-06T12:22:00.001-05:002009-03-06T12:22:30.115-05:00

We love e-books and the easy way one can publish new work on a variety of reader devices. We also appreciate and respect when hardcover books are donated to a library.  There is history in the print; there is provenance in the handing down; there is the mouldering stink of ink and finger grease on the pages. We are uncertain, however, if a gift of 200,000 electronic books should carry the same

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-81829062255940308542009-02-27T10:20:00.000-05:002009-02-27T10:20:40.397-05:00

We loathe Wikipedia because it is so widely used by students and because it is so easily corrupted with purposeful lies and mistruths. Wikipedia serves mass sycophancy -- not secular scholarship -- and that is its fatal flaw. The danger in Wikipedia is that it feels open and welcoming while really being a ruse against true intellectualism in an ever-growing-stupider populace. Anonymous

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-65750762353622662732009-02-20T08:41:00.000-05:002009-02-20T08:41:19.551-05:00

In a stunning and incomprehensible move, Brandeis University is selling 6,000 pieces of art and closing its art museum because of bad institutional budget management: Rocked by a budget crisis, Brandeis University will close its Rose Art Museum and sell off a 6,000-object collection that includes work by such contemporary masters as Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, and Nam June Paik. The move

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-77397225414611612482009-02-13T09:43:00.000-05:002009-02-13T09:43:37.309-05:00

We are thrilled to learn the awful Juicy Campus site is dead and gone. In its short life, the site generated controversy (and garnered a lot of media attention) over the content of student posts, which were often over-the-top, anonymous, and malicious. Some universities blocked the site from their networks due to concerns about student safety. The New Jersey Attorney General investigated the site

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-5438240104038659542009-02-06T08:20:00.026-05:002009-02-06T08:46:19.386-05:00

Are we in danger of losing our digital memories? Too many of us suffer from a condition that is going to leave our grandchildren bereft. I call it personal digital disorder. Think of those thousands of digital photographs that lie hidden on our computers. Few store them, so those who come after us will not be able to look at them. It's tragic. As chief executive of the British Library, it's my

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-57608411781443748812009-01-30T12:01:00.025-05:002009-01-30T12:33:48.107-05:00

We fully support the douchebags!  You can't insult people online and expect to escape unpunished.  A "douchebag" -- is never a compliment -- for it is the empty container of fluid used to flush clean a woman's vagina.  There's no mistaking the insult of being a limp, used up, 'gina bag. A federal district court in Connecticut has granted qualified immunity to the high school principal and the

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-47099293081777470662009-01-23T08:08:00.000-05:002009-01-23T09:05:28.883-05:00

We like to celebrate genius here and, sometimes, the story is best told by those who wove its threads -- so we turn over this space for a moment to the research pinnacles of Rice University: When speaking, a person must select one word from a competing set of words. For example, if the speaker wants to mention a specific animal, he has to single out "dog" from "cat," "horse" and other

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-70820278691684194142009-01-16T09:39:00.001-05:002009-01-16T09:48:36.329-05:00

We were disappointed to read this week that students are paying more and getting less for the money they spend to get a college education: In 2006, the last year for which data is available, students at public colleges and research universities paid about half the cost of their education — defined as the cost of instruction, student services and a portion of spending on operations, support and

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-64656621317689347562009-01-09T09:13:00.001-05:002009-01-09T09:31:16.457-05:00

This image of "Dick Licking" was emailed to us for wanton analysis and mocking -- and we are happy to oblige with the usual caveats and exceptions: After we stopped laughing, we realized how important context and conjecture are when it comes to creating memeingful moments in a political milieu. What worked then might fail today. Would an "Obama Will Beat Them Off!" button have been more

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-1625410374475080222009-01-03T14:15:00.001-05:002009-01-03T14:23:24.050-05:00

AccessTextNetwork is a tremendous new consortium project for major publishers to help provide accessible textbooks for the disabled: A goal of the AccessText Network is to provide college students access to resources on how to most effectively use alternative (electronic) textbooks and technology in the classroom as well as the study environment. Students are encouraged to join the AccessText

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-9113827368687833242008-12-27T14:51:00.001-05:002008-12-27T15:08:03.542-05:00

We love the idea of Digital Tenure.  Writing for electronic publishing should, and must, be considered in matters of awarding faculty tenure at traditional universities. Data is becoming a first-class object. In the days of completely paper publication, the article or book was the end of the line. And once the book was in libraries, the data were often thrown away or allowed to deteriorate. Now

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-53222908152626761972008-12-19T07:50:00.000-05:002008-12-19T08:02:41.307-05:00

How do we remember? Is there an inherent danger is misremembering? If we learn by thinking, is the preserved result of that process our saved memories? Here is a wonderful American Educator article about teaching our students to use their memory to create meaning instead of just remembering: The first principle—memory is the residue of thought—describes how memories are formed. What remains

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-18510988292524822442008-12-12T13:53:00.000-05:002008-12-12T13:58:10.097-05:00

We are pleased to announce the acquisition of the BolesUniversity.co.uk domain. We decided to make the purchase for two reasons: 1.  To see if we could.  We could! 2.  To expand our world presence beyond the United States.  We did! The rest of the story behind the curious addition may be found in this article: How to Ruin an Initial Enjoy!

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-20482431384935214582008-12-05T10:50:00.001-05:002008-12-05T11:23:24.423-05:00

You may remember the strange case of a student teacher that posted an image on her MySpace page as a drunken pirate. She lost her teaching internship and a chance to finish her undergraduate degree. She, of course, sued -- claiming her First Amendment right of free expression was violated. The judge in the case just rendered his decision. As I have found, Defendants do not have the authority

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-48286855683657219352008-11-21T09:27:00.000-05:002008-11-21T09:43:49.209-05:00

We are pleased to see Skype being used in universities as a universal method for communication beyond the strictures of a contemporary campus system. We use Skype to teach American Sign Language online and to also provide live tutoring with students via voice or video conferencing.   As the world expands, and as communities compress, we need more tools of enhanced communication to keep up with

Boles Universityhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14733937512586962183noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4410621662136715082.post-87919512624030417822008-11-14T10:06:00.000-05:002008-11-14T10:15:17.517-05:00

Reference Extract is a new, driving, mandate that we fully support in every ken and yaw: Reference Extract is envisioned as a web search engine, like Google, Yahoo and MSN. However, unlike other search engines, Reference Extracts will be built for maximum credibility by relying on the expertise and credibility judgments of librarians from around the globe. Users will enter a search term and get

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