There can be few things more deflating than working hard watching what you eat only to find that you gained 2 pounds. Writing and dieting have much in common. As I work with faculty, I often find myself giving advice for writing similar to dieting advice. In today’s post, I will share tips on how to measure your writing progress. As with dieting and many other areas of life, what we measure is what we improve.
For five decades, Building 20 stood on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The exterior of the building revealed its origins as a temporary structure built to accommodate post-World War II growth. Defined in an exhibit at the MIT Museum as a “plywood palace,” the wood-frame construction was nondescript and decidedly utilitarian. Despite its ramshackle appearance, the building came to embody the industrious spirit of the institution. MIT’s influential wartime radar project developed within its walls as well as the Institute’s first interdisciplinary projects. The Stata Center now stands on the former site of Building 20. The new construction, which includes over 720,000 square feet of space, “is meant to carry on Building 20’s innovative and serendipitous spirit” (Mitchell 2004). The building’s whimsical construction—including a design based solely on curves and angles—fosters creativity and interdisciplinary engagement for its occupants. As the Institute’s provost explained, “When you round the corner and see the Stata Center, you will know you’re at MIT.”
I was in Washington, DC for a conference this week and had a little free time in the afternoon. I had some writing to get done as it is always hard to keep up when you’re traveling. After thinking of a few neat places to write in the city, I decided to head down to the Library of Congress to study in the Main Reading Room. I strongly encourage anyone in town for an academic conference to take a few hours for studying at the Library of Congress Main Reading Room.
Some spaces are just conducive to writing and the Main Reading Room is one of them.
With the causes and challenges related to increased homogenization likely to continue influencing higher education, institutional diversity will likely continue to decline, which will threaten historical institutional missions. In today’s post, I want to share an excerpt from my monograph, Understanding Institutional Diversity in American Higher Education, with recommendations and future research to show campus leaders can support institutional diversity.
In the popular movie, Apollo 13, the astronauts are trapped with their oxygen running out. In a classic scene, all of the NASA engineers gather in a room with all of the stuff in the spacecraft and have to figure out how to make a square air filter fit a hole made for a round filter. Literally, the engineers have to make a square peg fit in a round hole. In today’s post, I want to share an IDEA from my book Teaching for Learning on how you can use this as the basis for a class activity.
In the Houston We Have a Problem IDEA, students are given a collection of items or information that they must use to solve a problem presented by the instructor.
The game is designed to encourage class participation, creativity, and problem solving.
