Category Archives: CURVE

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Randy Swearer – The Provost with a Message

  April 20, 2015 , , ,

Dr. Randy Swearer came to Georgia State University to give a 2-part talk titled “Understanding Emerging Trends in Higher Education” last week. Swearer has been provost of Philadelphia University since 2009 – and I find this to be an exceptional detail. It is exceptional because this is the first time I have heard someone with this kind of institutional power speak about a radical change in the system of higher education. Let me give you a summary: Swearer talks about the need to unbundle the university system. This means, in general, that we need to be less focused on disciplinarity, and more focused on a more flattened hierarchical system that relies on training for skills, rather than training for tests. It is student-centered, and it is a place where faculty can focus on a variety of ways to deliver content, rather then the way we have been doing it for the last 150 years. What is more, Swearer has a model that he believes might work. In the picture above, Swearer is showing an overview of his Part 1 talk before he goes into detail about his proposed system. Here, he proposes to disintegrate the existing model, opening up new ways for students to move through the system – minus arbitrary grading, lecture-only classrooms, and other models that critical pedagogues argue against. Once the talks were over, everyone I attended with that works in the Exchange had some very interesting conversation about Swearer’s proposed model. For me – the outcome … Continue reading

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Collaboration in Action

  December 7, 2014 , ,

Earlier this semester , Georgia State Anthropology hosted a visit from Dr. Dominique Rissolo. Dr. Rissolo is an accomplished researcher and is currently a program director at the Waitt Institute and is also involved with the Center for Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture and Archaeology (CISA 3). Dr. Rissolo was catching up with long time friend and GSU Faculty Dr. Jeffrey Glover, as well as presenting talks on Grant Writing as well as a National Geographic Institute research program at a Cenote in Quintana Roo known as Hoyo Negro or the Black Hole. He was also checking in as committee member on my thesis research as well as a GSU colleague of mine. Dr. Rissolo conducted his Dissertation research in the region of Quintana Roo where I am doing research for my thesis. We decided to catch up on thesis research at CURVE, as the venue proved ideal for looking at the kinds of data archaeologists deal with. Andrew

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“Education, Technology, and Society”

  October 26, 2014 , , , , ,

This week I sat in on the two presentations given by Rich Halverson on : Education, Technology, and Society Speaker Series Center for Instructional Innovation.   Much of his presentation was analyzing how technology does and can influence the way we educate and the way we learn.  Although some of the discussion was giving an overview of various approaches to education currently being used, what I found most interesting was his comment on the way kids and young adults communicate and interact with each other and the world. You no longer call you friend to make plans to meet, go to the public library to do research, or have to meet up in person to play a game- everything can be done remotely. You what information on a research topic for school, google it. You want to know where your friend is to see if they want to have lunch? Just see what they last tweeted or put on facebook, see if they have checked in somewhere or send a quick text.  Want to get with your friends and play the newest video game? Just get online and talk via your game console or computer.  Basic human interaction is not the same , yet the way we approach the classroom and education is shockingly stagnant. I believe in much of the traditional concepts utilized ino our public systems, but that is also in part because I do and have succeeded in them.  I am one of the few people I know … Continue reading

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BatchGeo: a simple tool for visualizing point data

  October 26, 2014 , ,

I would like to begin a series of “Maps for the Classroom: How To” blog posts that will share with readers different tips, trips, and tools that educators can use with little to no training to visualize spatial data. The first tool I would like to highlight is called BatchGeo. In CURVE this week, we had a student who came in and wanted to learn more about how to bring a spreadsheet of addresses into the ArcGIS environment. Well, as is not unusual for ArcMap, we ran into challenges when the geocode address tool kept giving us an error message. But never fear! BatchGeo is here! BatchGeo is a website that generates point based maps from Excel spreadsheets.  Let me provide a little overview of the workflow this site: First thing to do is organize your spreadsheet in a way that allows BatchGeo to “talk” to the information.  I suggest making column headers such as “Address” ,”City” ,”State” and “Zip Code”. You can also add additional information (some examples may be the name of the location or contact information for a business you’re representing)-this information will be displayed whenever you click on that location on your soon to be created map. When you’ve finished organizing all your information-all you have to do is copy and paste your spreadsheet into the box at the top of BatchGeo’s webpage.  Then hit the “Validate & Set Options” button.    BatchGeo typically is able to automatically detect which column is which, but to make … Continue reading

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Improvements in the CURVE experience

  October 23, 2014

As CURVE begins to gain “regulars” , “newbie” traffic, and large intellectual groups I continue to see the growth and resources that the CURVE space is able to provide for not just GSU students but the community. The visuals in the space are incredible and it is a daunting task coming up with ways to optimize all the resources that the CURVE space provides. As the weeks go by and seminars, classes, and research groups have come in and out of CURVE, its become a bit more clear the type of students and researchers that CURVE is meant to attract. These ambitious intellectuals are seeking knowledge on their own personal interest or to improve their abilities in the subject matter at hand. As a SIF member of two innovative projects as well as computer science major, the amount of knowledge that is out there simply by meeting the right people and gaining meaningful relationships has impacted me in being proactive to seek these opportunities much more especially when it is to gain that connection for a job or internship or simply for personal knowledge. One specific  The entrepreneur workshop seemed very useful in not only the sense of helping guide entrepreneurs and giving them the tools to succeed on their own but also to provide them opportunities to network. Specifically a guest speaker was brought to the workshop. The speaker named MK was a GSU alumni who has been the successful business  owner of 3 companies and was now working … Continue reading