#bridge communication gaps

[wysax]

In the modern educational landscape, technology plays an integral role in bridging communication gaps and enhancing the learning experience. School management apps have emerged as powerful tools to keep students and parents engaged, fostering a stronger connection between home and school. These applications streamline communication, provide easy access to information, and create a cohesive environment for all stakeholders involved. This blog post delves into the various ways school management apps achieve these goals, emphasizing their importance in today's educational framework.

[mikayesha]

Imagine if he started getting scared of bridges too

[irbcallmefynn]

Eventually the cringe energy within me will start bouncing around at such a high speed it will only be comprehendable as a tone. This tone will, of course, match the resonant frequency of reality (comparable to the resonant frequency of an orange) which will cause the laws of physics to be shaken apart violently, allowing me to perform ACE (Asexual Code Execution) and run Doom on every Chrysanthemum on Earth simultaneously. The combined satanic energy from this (identified by the Catholic church) will activate a sleeper agent gene in every therian in the world, causing us to all immediately transmogrify into our true selves.

When will this happen? Uhh idk I'll have to get back to you on that.

[energysynergymatrix]

Ok I bit the bullet and made an Ososan OC and his full name is Len Kanemaru.

He's the so-called perfect guy, pretty boy barista type turned up to 11, who might as well have manifested from thin air, who has genuine fanboys and fangirls, and most of the Matsunos want him fucking dead. He's oblivious to both of these aspects of the public opinion and seems kind of empty headed for the most part. He is also struggling just as badly as them but literally no one would believe him if he told them.

He also wants to kiss the oldest DESPITE the fact that his brothers are so jealous of him for being so perfect. Shenanigans ensue.

If you want a more detailed write up about him read the cut.

OK SO . Len is a guy trying his best to pretend to be an adult despite wanting to be anything but it. Unlike the Matsunos who dont pretend to be an adult and are anything but it, Len is trying to push through adult life while wanting to return to childhood when things were easier.

Sure he has a job as barista, but he's poor with money, spending it like he's still a teenager, struggles to maintain contact with people he’s befriended outside of work, DESPITE thinking people hating him is the end of the world, and surprisingly, still lives with his parents.

The thing is that he's REALLY good at pretending to have it all together. He has quite a few fanboys and fangirls and is often described as a prince. (It’s because of his charmingly good customer service skills that is his only real social experience post highschool.) But, despite being in his mid twenties, hes kind of poorly equipped socially and is unable to pick this up, despite it being clear to literally everyone.

(Like he thinks he’s being bad at pretending to be a well put together adult, and then turns around and can handle rush pretty well understaffed, not make any mistakes, and still keep a pleasant demeanor that his admirers swoon over. Anytime someone does act like a fan trying to get his love it’s met with confusion and just. “Huh.” more than anything. He doesn’t even reject them because he doesn’t realize so many people are in love with him)

This includes quite a few Matsunos who are jealous of him for being so popular (and admittedly kind of cool), find his princely yet oblivious attitude almost annoying, and somewhat creepy because of how much he knows about them from highschool. And those who aren't irritated by him are relatively apathetic towards him.

The only reason theyre so aware of him is the fact that he and Todomatsu worked at the same cafe before the latter quit. It was after he quit that Len properly met the sextuplets, having a chance encounter with the boys sometime after. Todomatsu was already irritated by him, by again, seeing above, but also because he already seemed intimately familiar with Totty during his highschool years.

It's like they had a whole classmate just manifest into being while skipping the "actually go to class together" part.

(They did actually go to school together but literally no one knew he existed during then. Not to their fault though, Len was basically that one vine that's like "I can't I have so much to do tomorrow" *fucks around on the keyboard. Because of that Len ended up being bad with people by the time he graduated and was ushered into the work force by his parents. As a result he can't really keep friends, often times contact dying off on accident. A lot of the time spent working is him TRYING his best to maintain relationships as an adult but it never really works out. Deep down Len wishes he could redo highschool, so he could not only get this skills but also find some memories that he so clearly missed out on. Because he willingly opted out of making those therefore other people don’t remember him. As far as he knows he hasn’t really had a friend since middle school.)

But like after the two and Totty's brothers encountered each other in public a whole bomb got dropped and nothing was the same.

Despite generally not liking him the Matsunos keep him around, mostly due to Totty's insistence saying they can use him (so they cant kill him yet!) but because Len is kind of bad with people in general outside of having a fandom (that, again, came with his customer service skills), and the Matsunos are the Matsunos, this never ever goes well.

Despite this and how much shenanigans the Matsunos end up dragging him into, he considers them friends since its the closest relationship he's maintained outside of his house. On top of that, he almost admires them for being NEETs. He's kind of ashamed of it, because he knows they have to be an adult, but because he's struggling so much as an adult, he wants nothing more than to be like them. He wants to stop being an adult and return to highschool.

It's why he takes to Osomatsu so much, since he seems most open about how shitty he is and how much he doesnt want to grow up. Like weirdly enough, his man-child behavior is what makes Len likes him so much. Sure he also has a big heart and loves his family, and Len can acknowledge Oso’s best aspects, but it’s the worst parts of him that loves.

And that admiration for having his character laid out flat and embracing his childishness despite his age and situation, how he practically will just grow up when he wants to rather than when he has to (unlike Len), makes the perfect man fall for the loser guy.

The more he hangs around the Matsunos the more they encourage him to tap into his evil side, and may end up making him worse, but for now he's Mr Perfect and most of them hate him for that. He doesn't get the message though so he's just kind of hanging around them for now.

Anyways he and Osomatsu are literally I'm Glad You're Evil Too to me . And also look at these sketches of him .

[alternativeulster]

habitual be is my favourite dialect feature of all time ever, bc it originates in BOTH hiberno-english (specifically scots-irish dialects) and AAVE, and while we don't know for sure if one influenced the other or not, the prevailing theory is that they evolved completely independent of each other. the irish language, and many caribbean languages, have native habitual markers!! there's no direct translation in english, so it's natural to use the verb "be"!! it's literally translating the conventions of a bunch of different native languages onto english to fill in a gap!!!

[nohkalikai]

i truly can't articulate just how much strong, supportive friendships have changed me from being a very un-chill, suspicious, angry, scared, mistrustful person to someone who is secure, calm, trustful, and very willing to take risks. i want to be that sort of presence in other people's lives too. and the best part about having healthy friendships is that i know that i am a good presence in my friends' lives.

[eumeliafeu]

Can I just say something? Okay, so, I think the funniest live bloggers are the Brazilians. They are so funny, and for what? I can almost always find something to laugh at in their live blogging for each day and I am just sitting looking through my tags and nearly laughing in the middle of one of my classes. Thank you, so so much Brazilians. You guys and your CCs are so dear to me. I can almost always find enjoyment in the live streams even if I can't understand a word they are saying(I can pick up little things here and there and it honestly makes me so happy) and it is so awesome coming on here and looking at the QSMP live blogging tag and figuring out through the live bloggers.

Other English speakers that are fans of the QSMP need to realize that the Spanish speakers and Brazilians are a part of our community and without them, we wouldn't have some really cool content. I am tired of seeing people make fun of or generally being awful to the CCs or even fellow fans. Do better.

Again, thank you Brazilian fans and also thank you to the Spanish speaking fans. You guys are awesome. Keep doing you and I hope other English speaking fans start appreciating you more, or even as much as I do and that they try to understand even a little bit, whether it's through learning one of the languages, even just watching the Brazilian and Hispanic creators and finding the cognates and understanding even a little bit, or even just interacting with fans who don't speak English as their first language and taking the time to even put their words through google translate(honestly, as someone learning Spanish, it isn't great but if you have a reading level over that of a first grader then you should be able to figure it out even then) just to help it reach more people as most social media sites are more English friendly than they are to any other language.

Feel free to translate this post so it can reach more people. I don't really care for credit but it would be really nice because we need to start crediting people more in not just this space but also in other spaces. Credit artists and writers, they are the back bones of many fandoms, especially ours. The museum in the QSMP itself credits the artists. Give credit where credit is due.

[theheartchoice]

Has it really been ten years? 

That's way too long, Cas. We don't need to work together just to hang out, right? 

*gazes fondly at Dean* Right.

#suptober22 day 15: smoke

[daybreakrising]

VAUTRIN DRABBLE; BREAKING NEWS

The news was quick to break across Fontaine. Captain Vautrin, right-hand to the Iudex, has been arrested for murder.

Aurélie was not one for gossip, and often disregarded the sly whisperings passed between her neighbours should it reach her own ears. Gossip was unsavoury, its intentions usually to slander, to sully. Therefore, it was not worth her time. There were, however, certain key words that would draw her attention without fail – and one of those was the name of her son.

She had barely taken three strides from the gates of her home before she felt the gazes of many upon her, heard the blanket of whispers descend around her. This in itself was nothing out of the ordinary for her. A star upon the stage since her girlhood, possessing of both great beauty and talent, she has spent a lifetime in the spotlight, for better and for worse. But there was an air about Fontaine this morning that filled her with a sense of building dread. And then… she heard it.

Captain Vautrin… arrested for murder.

Vautrin.

Vautrin.

The blood drained from her face in an instant. No… no it cannot be… this must be a cruel rumour… Yet now she could see the heavy presence of gardes in the streets, the unusual liveliness at what is typically a quiet hour of the morning. And the looks her neighbours were giving her… pity, she recognised, and judgement. The spotlight has often weighed on her shoulders before now, but this is something else. She has never been looked at with such… negativity.

It takes but a few seconds for her to turn on her heel and flee back into the sanctuary of her home.

"Évariste! Évariste!" She dashes through the spacious hallway with none of her usual grace and poise, until she all but stumbles into the concerned arms of her husband. She lifts her gaze to his, sees the surprise, the question that lingers there, and her eyes fill with tears. It is an effort to make her lips move, to force the words out. "Something terrible has happened…"

--

Évariste, at first, refused to believe it. With an insistence that it was a misunderstanding, or some deliberately spiteful lie, he left her cowering behind closed doors whilst he sought answers. She begged him not to go, to stay with her here, but he would not listen. So she lingered, alone, pacing the rooms that were once filled with life, but now feel empty. She drew the drapes over every window, lest the entirety of Fontaine come to peek at the disgraced family, surrounding herself with a darkness that matched the one in her heart.

Time ticks by without her acknowledgement – so lost is she in her thoughts that she finds herself standing in a room she has not entered in many years, quite without realising her feet were taking her there.

Everything is just as it was.

Neither of them could ever bring themselves to move a single thing, and so it remains like a museum display of what once was. She stands amidst the last echoes of her son – a bed still neatly made by his hands, a stack of books left behind on his bedside table, clothes that no longer fit him still hanging in his closet. He had taken some items on his departure, but he had not taken them all, and neither had they sent them to his new place of residence. Perhaps, she mused now, they had hoped he would return for them, would return to them. But he never had.

The room beside this one is similar in its state of preservation. Two children they'd had, and two children they'd lost. Where did we go wrong in life? What did we do to warrant this agony?

There is only one thing out of place here, an addition she has made herself: a book, sitting in pride of place on the empty desk by the window. It is to this that she moves towards, her hands smoothing over the soft leather cover before carefully opening it to the first page. Her fingertips trace over an old flyer, affixed to the page with great care, for a production long since retired: but it is her son's name that features in big, bold letters. His debut on the stage. Oh, how they'd had such dreams for his future.

She turns the page as painful memories rear their ugly heads. Such talent he'd had… he had moved with such grace, such elegance. She had wept every time she watched him dance, and now she weeps for what could have been. She flips carefully through page after page of memories, of recorded achievements and awards, of performance advertisements and playbills. She cannot bear to look at them for long. After a time, the playbills and awards stop, to be replaced instead by notices and clippings from newspapers, many of them bearing headlines:

Notorious Thief Apprehended At Last By Rookie Garde Young Garde Saves Drowning Children Special Security Officer Uncovers Hidden Nefarious Plot! Remarkable Garde Becomes Youngest Special Security Captain In History Captain Vautrin: Right Hand To The Iudex?

She lingers upon this last clipping, her gaze resting heavily upon the image that accompanies it. The Iudex of Fontaine, standing as elegantly and imposing as ever, beside a handsome young man in a pristine uniform. There is no colour to the image, but she can picture the vibrant wine of his hair, the soft hazel of his eyes. Her boy, her beloved boy, achieving greatness in his own way, just as he had promised he would.

It is here that Évariste finds her. He stands at her back, hands upon her shoulders – hands that long to comfort, but cannot, for he brings only dire tidings. It is no lie. Their son has indeed been arrested for murder, and a murder most atrocious at that. He has stained his name, tarnished his previously pristine reputation. He has thrown everything away, yet again. Yet again, it is in the name of a cause he believes in, a cause he will not falter upon.

Amongst the agony of this terrible truth, there is a flicker of something fond: he may have grown, may have changed from the boy that walked away from them without looking back, but at heart… he is still the same. Still their Vautrin.

But the flicker cannot survive for long amidst the smothering dread – for they have well and truly lost their last remaining child. He will be sentenced to a life beneath the sea, never to return. He will go beyond their reach for the last time. Tomorrow's paper will bear a new headline, but one that will never make it into this book:

Captain Vautrin: Guilty Of Brutal Slaughter

[frillyheathen]

Been grappling with the internalized idea that art needs to be seen by someone else in order for it to be of value. I logically know that art can Just Exist in the same way that people Just Exist and the way that plants Just Exist and everything that exists can Just Exist, but whenever I'm making something whether it be a painting or poem or a sculpture I am constantly just thinking about how it needs to be good so I can show someone.

And it's not even about justifying the time I spent on it; I've gotten to a point where I don't feel a lot of guilt about leisure activities or "wasting time". I just have this deep internal need to be validated for every creation.

Part of it is that art is about communication, about taking the abstract concepts of life, emotion, and experience and turning them into something tangible that someone else can look at and say, "I understand this." So when I'm creating I am thinking ahead about how I will communicate with others through art.

But sometimes I make something that I know no one else will see and I still feel the pressure to make it good so I can show someone. And this is real annoying because it kills the creative spirit and makes hobbies into chores. So then I can't make art for fun or profit.

And so then I start thinking that maybe the real enemy is a fear of communicating with myself. Because being alone with your own thoughts is pretty scary when your entire stable identity is built off of reflecting other people like light off a mirror.

(A.k.a. a lot of words to justify that one fanfiction I haven't updated since 2020).

[blujayonthewing]

if you cast speak with animals and talk to a forest gnome who's speaking as if to a bird would you understand them or does the magic behind those processes work differently enough that they'd slide right off each other

[fair-lead]

thinkgin about genly and estraven again

[trollbreak]

Ohhh!! i love this idea, umm, what about bloodthirst for the sorting?

This one is a lil tough to convey! Peipre is in pale and ashen with both those guys, and also acts flush with marrow still some of the time, so I was a bit uncertain on where entirely to put that dot, but I think falling most into pale works!

Dexter is from @skull-exe teehee! I like that guy :3

[jcmarchi]

Edgerton Center hosts workshop for deaf high school students in STEM

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/edgerton-center-hosts-workshop-for-deaf-high-school-students-in-stem/

Edgerton Center hosts workshop for deaf high school students in STEM

The percentage of deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals who have bachelor’s degrees is 15.2 percent lower than their hearing counterparts, and for those who do have degrees, most are in business and education. Deaf adults with degrees in STEM fields are few and far between. MIT Edgerton Center instructor Amanda Gruhl Mayer ’99, PhD ’08 has set out to bridge this gap by piloting a new MIT workshop called STEAMED (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math Experience for Deaf and hard-of-hearing students). 

The workshop tasked students with building an underwater remotely operated vehicle (ROV), teaching them new skills to build circuits, motors, and frames. At the end of the course, students tested their robots at the Z Center pool. Gruhl Mayer worked with Brian Gibson, a science teacher at Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing; Edgerton Center instructors Chris Mayer and Christian Cardozo ’18; and MIT student mentors rising senior Ryn Moore and Ruben Castro ’24. With several instructors and mentors at varying levels of American Sign Language (ASL) fluency, ASL interpreters strengthened communication between all participants.

Gruhl Mayer became interested in deaf education when she moved into her first house in 2020 and met her neighbor’s deaf 13-year-old daughter, who was interested in science. Gruhl Mayer wanted to encourage her to delve deeper into STEM subjects. As she learned ASL, Gruhl Mayer quickly discovered that important scientific terms, like “amino acid,” “acceleration,” and “circuit,” lack common signs in ASL because there aren’t enough deaf scientists and engineers for the vocabulary to develop naturally. While pursuing a master’s degree in deaf education at Boston University, she deepened her passion for deaf culture. “I really want to push the pipeline for more deaf scientists and engineers. And I think we need to start with students,” Gruhl Mayer says.

Gruhl Mayer’s students entered the course not knowing exactly what they would be building, and quickly learned how to construct their own ROVs using SeaPerch kits from the MIT Sea Grant program. The ROV project is a favorite at the Edgerton Center for introducing high school students to power tools and circuits, and this is the first time it was presented to deaf students. During the workshop, the students and interpreters developed signs to use for new skills and concepts, like “soldering” and “buoyancy.”

Students waterproofed their motors, built thrusters, and connected them to controllers. They used power tools to create PVC pipe frames with attached foam core to make them neutrally buoyant, then tested the movement of their ROVs in a small tank inside the classroom. Students modified their designs to create unique ROVs, decorating them using lights and colored markers, and took them for a test drive in the Z Center Pool. Students picked up skills quickly and taught each other as they learned, each designing a unique ROV that could move in all directions, navigate through obstacles, and even pick something up off the bottom of the pool.

Brian Gibson, who’s been teaching hands-on science at Horace Mann for 21 years, says, “I’ve enjoyed watching the students become more independent and using different materials and tools that they haven’t used in the past and become pretty proficient with those tools.” The students also enjoyed the increased responsibility. “Typically, we’re not allowed to use certain tools. They don’t offer us much responsibility. And so now, we were able to see how the tools work. I think that opens new opportunities for us,” says Bárbara Silva, a rising junior at the Horace Mann School. Students also appreciated the freedom and creativity that comes with not being graded. “At school, at home, or anywhere, things have to be perfect. But here, you could fail, and then you learn something new,” says rising junior at Newton North High School Lucy Howard-Karp.

Among the takeaways for the Edgerton Center instructors is recognizing the unique challenge of having to use your hands for communication while concurrently building. For example, hearing teachers often said “good job” to students while they were working, which made the students stop their work to watch the interpreter. Students requested that teachers wait for a good stopping point to give them praise, and only interrupt if the students are doing something that needs to be corrected. Gruhl Mayer points out, “Deaf students are just like hearing students. They have the same potential, enthusiasm, work ethic, etc. But there are educational tweaks that need to be made for deaf students, to help them learn in the way that’s best for them.”

Gruhl Mayer’s vision to make STEM accessible for deaf students has the potential to drive discoveries in the science community. “The term is called ‘deaf gain,’” she explains. “Deaf people see the world differently, which gives them a new and fresh perspective. This unique viewpoint drives their creativity and innovation. So many amazing discoveries have been made by deaf scientists and engineers.”

Gruhl Mayer plans to run the workshop again next summer with more participants, hopefully having this year’s students come back as mentors. The students plan to get their fellow classmates excited to sign up by bringing their ROVs to school and showing off what they built.

[reinemichele]

Well uhhhhh I wanted to make a post but I. typed way too many vulnerable things so I discarded that post

I wanted to say that, I really appreciate the... lived in, let's say, examples of abuse in iw/tv, because when I was younger I always struggled trying to speak about what happened in my family, because all the examples I had to give were so over the top that they sounded cartoonish

I don't want to give examples of what happened to me or in my family, but like... "Why would anyone say that to their own kid?" "Isn't that illegal?" "Well, she probably had X disorder, she wouldn't have done that if she saw a doctor." "It can't be that bad :/"

When I was in elementary school, I didn't want to answer any of these (invasive and inappropriate) questions, at all. But when I got to middle school, I did start to wish that I could bridge the gap, and explain to someone why the word "family" meant fear and resentment and cruelty to me. But it felt like the burden of proof was on me, and I didn't have... photographs of bruising, or text message screenshots. I had anecdotes that sounded made up.

The gleeful sadism and intentional cruelty, the methodical psychological torture, the ways the characters give themselves plausible deniability or withhold the truth or gaslight... Calling C a mistake, her saying "It was never about me, I was just a shingle that flew off your roof!"

Nowadays, I appreciate when there's something in a movie or tv show that I could point out and be like... That, verbatim, was said to me. I watched that happen to my cousin. That's why the smell of whiskey makes me nauseous. That's why cars freak my mom out. The look on that kid actor's face is how I felt every christmas and thanksgiving and easter and halloween. It's not even like I intend to say any of those things; I, pretty clearly, intend to take a lot of these anecdotes to the grave instead of opening up about them.

I just feel relieved that the burden of proof isn't so much on abused kids anymore, that it's easier to discuss. I'm glad we're moving towards this place where we're not expected to filter out our lived reality so we don't make someone else sad. That's what I want for all of us, for future kids in similar situations.

Also because this is this website, I'm not condemning any of the characters or calling them irredeemable or saying that I hate them or anything. I enjoy all of them, I think they're compelling and sympathetic and amazingly dynamic and complex and interesting. Thankfully, I've gotten myself to the point that characters can remind me of my family without sending me into a panic attack. I'm just sayin'... sometimes characters do be reminding me of the vile motherfuckers I share blood with, for better and worse.

[mizufae]

#1 argument that Mike, Will, Dustin, and Lucas are all neurodivergent is “friends don’t lie” because if that’s not the product of four little ND kids finally finding people who they can consistently communicate with then I don’t know what else it could be.

Yeah I’m still rotating these blorbos idk why