#university of massachusetts lowell

[the-hog-trough]

saw amherst.

not good.

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

NASA honors Algerian parks with Martian namesakes

NASA's mapping of Mars now bears the names of three iconic Algerian national parks, Algerian physicist Noureddine Melikechi, a member of the US space agency's largest Mars probe mission, has told AFP.

The Tassili n'Ajjer, Ghoufi and Djurdjura national parks have found their Martian namesakes after a proposition by Melikechi, which he sought as both a tribute to his native Algeria and a call to protect Earth.

"Our planet is fragile, and it's a signal to the world that we really need to take care of our national parks, whether they are in Algeria or elsewhere," the US-based scientist told AFP in a recent interview.

He said the visual resemblance between some of the Martian landscapes and the ones after which they were labeled was also a key reason for the naming.

"The first one that came to my mind was the Tassili n'Ajjer," he said of the UNESCO-listed vast plateau in the Sahara Desert with prehistoric art dating back at least 12,000 years.

"Every time I see pictures of Mars, they remind me of Tassili n'Ajjer, and now every time I see Tassili n'Ajjer, it reminds me of Mars," added Melikechi, who left Algeria in 1990 for the United States, where he now teaches at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.

The ancient art found in Tassili n'Ajjer depicts figures that can seem otherworldly, he said.

Some of the paintings show single-eyed and horned giants, among others which French archaeologist Henri Lhote dubbed as "great Martian" deities in his 1958 book, "The Search for the Tassili Frescoes".

"Those paintings are a signature... a book of how people used to live," said Melikechi.

"You see animals, but also figures that look like they came from somewhere else."

'Historic'

Melikechi's second pick was the Ghoufi canyon in eastern Algeria, whose rocky desert landscape was the site of an ancient settlement off the Aures Mountains.

Now a UNESCO-listed site and a tourist attraction, it has cliffside dwellings carved in the mountain, a testament to human resilience in a place where survival can be adverse.

"Ghoufi gives you a sense that life can be hard, but you can manage to keep at it as you go," Melikechi said.

"You can see that through those homes."

The third site, Djurdjura, is a snowy mountain range some 140 kilometers (about 90 miles) east of the capital Algiers.

Comapred to Tassili or Ghoufi, it bears the least resemblance to Mars.

Melikechi said its pick stemmed of Djurdjura's "reminder of the richness of natural habitats".

He said the naming process came after Perseverence, NASA's Mars rover exploring the Red Planet, made it into uncharted territory.

That area was then split into small quadrants, each needing a name.

"We were asked to propose names for specific quadrants," he said.

"I suggested these three national parks, while others proposed names from parks worldwide. A team then reviewed and selected the final names."

The announcement, made by NASA earlier this month, sparked celebrations among Algerians.

Algerian Culture Minister Zouhir Ballalou hailed it as a "historic and global recognition" of the North African country's landscapes.

Melikechi said he hopes that it will attract more visitors as Algeria has been striving to promote tourism, especially in the Sahara region, with authorities promising to facilitate tourist visas.

Official figures said some 2.5 million tourists visited the country last year—its highest number of visitors in two decades.

"These places are a treasure that we as humans have inherited," Melikechi said.

"We need to make sure they are preserved."

[emwheezie]

Re-uploading character lore with name change updates!

This story follows the friendship of Lennon and Tony as they take the world head on, trying to make music together. The story is based in Cambridge/Somerville Massachusetts in 2009.

Tony Wretzky (born October 3 1983) studied law at Boston University. After college, he didn't do anything with his degree and moved to Somerville, MA with his girlfriend Meg. (He's the type of person who constantly needs attention and is almost never without a girlfriend or boyfriend. (He's Bi). 

Tony grew up in Lowell, MA and attended a Catholic high school, Unlike Lennon, Tony has a pretty decent relationship with his parents.

He's super smart, book smart and emotionally smart. He is a talented writer and poet and great at marketing himself and bringing ideas to life. He's big into punk and hardcore music, (though his parents think this means he only really listens to Green Day). Tony picked up the bass guitar cause he thought it'd be the easiest to learn... it was not easy. Lennon tries to help him out a lot and he's supposed to improve throughout the comic. While Lennon really cares about the music, Tony just hyped up to be in a band and live that kind of life.

Tony believes nothing is accidental and everything he does has purpose. Everything has a reason behind it, even if he has to look a little deeper to find it's meaning.

Tony world is shook when he meets Oli LaBlanc by accident one day. (I'm not gonna get too much into Oli right now, but just know he's a photographer/videographer and graphic designer from NY who is living in the Boston area for work)

The two hit it off right away and become quick friends... Maybe even more...

In a group of friends, Tony would probably be called the mom friend. He's kind and caring and his emotional intelligence gets him far. People love Tony for his friendly and upbeat demeanor and think he's the best looking of the group. He's the type of dude that could really get anything he wants out of life. Unfortunately, Tony has a streak of self sabotage.

Tony often puts others before him. His main priority is making sure his friends are happy and doing well, especially his best friend Lennon. The two of them work really well together, they're like perfect fitting but opposite puzzle pieces. They're two dudes you probably wouldn't expect to be friends by appearance alone.

Tony also picks up crochet at one point... But that's getting into spoiler territory. Heheheh

[rrlexchange]

Ralph Lauren Takes His Line on the Road

By Stephanie Strom Sept. 23, 1993 (Originally published in the NYT)

While other retailers are taking their acts to television's home shopping networks, Ralph Lauren is taking his new line of jeans and rugged clothing on the road in an 18-wheeler.

A team of nine young salespeople yesterday started selling the designer's RRL, or Double RL collection out of a Peterbilt semitractor trailer truck parked on the campus of New York University in Manhattan. The trailer, painted with mustangs running across one side and pulled by a cherry red cab, plans to visit college campuses across the country cultivating customers who might otherwise miss the company's more traditional marketing efforts.

"It's a traveling billboard," Mr. Lauren, who looked as if he had just stepped out of one of the on-board dressing rooms in full RRL attire, said in a truckside interview at N.Y.U.

But it goes beyond that. The truck gives the designer, who is as much a savvy marketer as he is a fashion maven, and his retail empire reach beyond the fashion magazines and department store shops that feature RRL clothes. College students do not necessarily look to the ads in Esquire and Vogue for wardrobe ideas, Mr. Lauren reasons, or spend money in department and specialty stores.

Ralph had challenged us to come up with a new way of reaching young people because they don't read magazines as much," said Mary Randolph Carter, vice president of advertising for the Polo Ralph Lauren Corporation.

Peter Strom, the company's to-the-point President, explained that the traveling store was not about making a profit but, rather, about making a statement. The truck is scheduled to stop on college campuses through the first week of December, but Mr. Strom said he would be willing to finance a spring tour if the one this fall won the company exposure.

That sales are a secondary goal is not surprising, since $68 blue jeans and $78 flannel shirts may not fit into the average college student's budget. But Mr. Lauren is not worried about prices. "All the prices are very competitive," he said. "My products are really good products, high quality, and people will pay for that." Thrift-Shop Ambience.

The shop inside the truck, which has a sort of a Salvation-Army-thrift-shop-meets-general-store atmosphere, opens onto a tented area where clothes are stacked on battered industrial work tables, tossed into baskets or hung on mobile pipe racks. The collection is heavy on items like roomy barn jackets, tooled belts, faded flannel shirts and worn jeans

To handle logistics and campus politics, the company teams up at each campus it plans to visit with a student group, which then makes arrangements for the truck's arrival. In exchange, the traveling RRL shop donates 10 percent of its profits to the sponsoring organization.

Ads in campus newspapers and an "800" telephone number help herald the arrival of the truck, which stays two days at each campus. After leaving N.Y.U. it will head for the University of Connecticut at Storrs and then the University of Massachusetts at Lowell.

Said Sam Hamilton, the 29-year-old road manager who is leading the team, "I figure I can write a memoir when it's all over."

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Spontaneous Processes

A spontaneous process is a process that proceeds without any external intervention or energy input. External factors, such as temperature, can influence whether a process is spontaneous in the first place, but no additional energy is added to the process. For example, above 0C/32F ice will melt spontaneously. Below that temperature it will not. (Spontaneous processes are not spontaneously reversible; spontaneous processes move toward equilibrium, not away from it.) In addition, it is important to note that speed is not a factor in determining spontaneity. One example of this is in the decay of radioisotopes, which can have wildly varying half-lives but all decay spontaneously. Mathematically, spontaneity can be determined by looking at the change in free energy of the system, or the change in entropy of both the system and the surroundings.

Sources/Further Reading: (Images source - LibreTexts) (Florida State University) (University of Massachusetts Lowell) (University of Pennsylvania) (Wikipedia)

[mariacallous]

America’s first large-scale offshore wind farms began sending power to the Northeast in early 2024, but a wave of wind farm project cancellations and rising costs have left many people with doubts about the industry’s future in the US.

Several big hitters, including Ørsted, Equinor, BP, and Avangrid, have canceled contracts or sought to renegotiate them in recent months. Pulling out meant the companies faced cancellation penalties ranging from $16 million to several hundred million dollars per project. It also resulted in Siemens Energy, the world’s largest maker of offshore wind turbines, anticipating financial losses in 2024 of around $2.2 billion.

Altogether, projects that had been canceled by the end of 2023 were expected to total more than 12 gigawatts of power, representing more than half of the capacity in the project pipeline.

So, what happened, and can the US offshore wind industry recover?

I lead the University of Massachusetts Lowell’s Center for Wind-Energy Science, Technology, and Research (WindSTAR) and Center for Energy Innovation, and follow the industry closely. The offshore wind industry’s troubles are complicated, but it’s far from dead in the US, and some policy changes may help it find firmer footing.

A Cascade of Approval Challenges

Getting offshore wind projects permitted and approved in the US takes years and is fraught with uncertainty for developers, more so than in Europe or Asia.

Before a company bids on a US project, the developer must plan the procurement of the entire wind farm, including making reservations to purchase components such as turbines and cables, construction equipment, and ships. The bid must also be cost-competitive, so companies have a tendency to bid low and not anticipate unexpected costs, which adds to financial uncertainty and risk.

The winning US bidder then purchases an expensive ocean lease, costing in the hundreds of millions of dollars. But it has no right to build a wind project yet.

Before starting to build, the developer must conduct site assessments to determine what kind of foundations are possible and identify the scale of the project. The developer must consummate an agreement to sell the power it produces, identify a point of interconnection to the power grid, and then prepare a construction and operation plan, which is subject to further environmental review. All of that takes about five years, and it’s only the beginning.

For a project to move forward, developers may need to secure dozens of permits from local, tribal, state, regional, and federal agencies. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which has jurisdiction over leasing and management of the seabed, must consult with agencies that have regulatory responsibilities over different aspects in the ocean, such as the armed forces, Environmental Protection Agency, and National Marine Fisheries Service, as well as groups including commercial and recreational fishing, Indigenous groups, shipping, harbor managers, and property owners.

In December 2023, the majority of offshore wind power capacity was in China and Europe. The United States had just 42 megawatts, but it was about to launch two new wind farms. (Data source: WFO Global Wind Offshore Wind Report 2023.)

For Vineyard Wind I—which began sending power from five of its 62 planned wind turbines off Martha’s Vineyard in early 2024—the time from BOEM’s lease auction to getting its first electricity to the grid was about nine years.

Costs Balloon During Regulatory Delays

Until recently, these contracts didn’t include any mechanisms to adjust for rising supply costs during the long approval time, adding to the risk for developers.

From the time today’s projects were bid to the time they were approved for construction, the world dealt with the Covid-19 pandemic, inflation, global supply chain problems, increased financing costs, and the war in Ukraine. Steep increases in commodity prices, including for steel and copper as well as in construction and operating costs, made many contracts signed years earlier no longer financially viable.

Led by China and the UK, the world had 67,412 megawatts of offshore wind power capacity in operation by the end of 2023. (Source: WTO Global Offshore Wind Report.)

New and rebid contracts are now allowing for price adjustments after the environmental approvals have been given, which is making projects more attractive to developers in the US. Many of the companies that canceled projects are now rebidding.

The regulatory process is becoming more streamlined, but it still takes about six years, while other countries are building projects at a faster pace and larger scale.

Shipping Rules, Power Connections

Another significant hurdle for offshore wind development in the US involves a century-old law known as the Jones Act.

The Jones Act requires vessels carrying cargo between US points to be US-built, US-operated, and US-owned. It was written to boost the shipping industry after World War I. However, there are only three offshore wind turbine installation vessels in the world that are large enough for the turbines proposed for US projects, and none are compliant with the Jones Act.

That means wind turbine components must be transported by smaller barges from US ports and then installed by a foreign installation vessel waiting offshore, which raises the cost and likelihood of delays.

Dominion Energy is building a new ship, the Charybdis, that will comply with the Jones Act. But a typical offshore wind farm needs more than 25 different types of vessels—for crew transfers, surveying, environmental monitoring, cable-laying, heavy lifting, and many other roles.

The nation also lacks a well-trained workforce for manufacturing, construction, and operation of offshore wind farms.

For power to flow from offshore wind farms, the electricity grid also requires significant upgrades. The Department of Energy is working on regional transmission plans, but permitting will undoubtedly be slow.

Lawsuits and Disinfo

Numerous lawsuits from advocacy groups that oppose offshore wind projects have further slowed development.

Wealthy homeowners have tried to stop wind farms that might appear in their ocean view. Astroturfing groups that claim to be advocates of the environment, but are actually supported by fossil fuel industry interests, have launched disinformation campaigns.

In 2023, many Republican politicians and conservative groups immediately cast blame for whale deaths off the coast of New York and New Jersey on the offshore wind developers, but the evidence points instead to increased ship traffic collisions and entanglements with fishing gear.

Such disinformation can reduce public support and slow projects’ progress.

Just Keep Spinnin’

The Biden administration set a goal to install 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030, but recent estimates indicate that the actual number will be closer to half that.

Despite the challenges, developers have reason to move ahead.

The Inflation Reduction Act provides incentives, including federal tax credits for the development of clean energy projects and for developers that build port facilities in locations that previously relied on fossil fuel industries. Most coastal state governments are also facilitating projects by allowing for a price readjustment after environmental approvals have been given. They view offshore wind as an opportunity for economic growth.

These financial benefits can make building an offshore wind industry more attractive to companies that need market stability and a pipeline of projects to help lower costs—projects that can create jobs and boost economic growth and a cleaner environment.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Five years ago, after a man deliberately drove a van down a busy Toronto sidewalk in one of Canada’s worst mass murders, the country was confronted with a previously obscure extremist movement, which experts say remains a growing threat.

The attacker, Alek Minassian, had claimed to be angered by women who wouldn’t sleep with him and inspired by“incels,” or involuntary celibates.

[...]

Arie Perliger, the director of security studies at the University of Massachusetts – Lowell, said law enforcement agencies now see incels and groups with misogynist ideology as a rising concern.

“The threat is growing,” he said. “It will continue to be a problem.”

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[film-classics]

Bette Davis - The First Lady of the American Screen

Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (born in Lowell, Massachusetts on April 5, 1908) was an American actress who is one of the most prominent of the 20th century, making her "The First Lady of the American Screen."

Coming from an English family, Davis got a part as a chorus girl and made her Broadway debut in 1929 after graduating from Cushing Academy. One year later, moved to Hollywood to test for Universal. She got a contract, but her first films were unsuccessful.

She joined Warner Bros. in 1932 and had her breakthrough in Of Human Bondage (1934). Even after losing a legal case to cancel her contract, she became a celebrated leading lady. A period of decline in the 1940s was redeemed with her role in All About Eve (1950), often cited as her best. Her final years were marred by ill health, but she continued acting until shortly before her death from breast cancer in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France at 81.

Legacy:

Won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice: Dangerous (1936) and Jezebel (1939)

Was the 1st person to have 10 Oscar nominations for acting and set a record for the most consecutive with five

Nominated for three Golden Globe Best Actress: 1951, 1962, and 1963, and the Primetime Emmy Award in 1979 and nominated in 1980 and 1983

Nominated for the 1959 BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress

Won the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the 1937 Venice Film Festival

Won the National Board of Review Best Acting twice in 1939 and 1942

Won the Photoplay Awards - Best Performances of the Month in Jul 1939 and Dec 1950 and the 1963 Most Popular Female Star

Listed by the Motion Picture Herald as one of America’s top-10 box office draws in 1939 to 1941 and 1944

Co-founded the Hollywood Canteen in 1941

Elected as 1st female president of the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1941

Won Best Actress for at the 1945 Picturegoer Awards

Awarded a Meritorious Civilian Service Award in 1946 and a Distinguished Civilian Service Medal by the Defense Department in 1983

Won the Golden Apple Award for Most Cooperative Actress in 1941 and 1963 and Life Achievement Award in 1983

Won Best Actress at Cannes Film Festival, New York Film Critics Circle, and Nastro d'Argento for All About Eve (1951)

Honored with a block in the forecourt of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in 1950

Won the Golden Laurel for Top Female Dramatic Performance for Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)

Received the Craft of Cinema Award at the 1969 San Francisco International Film Festival and a special 20th Anniversary Award for All About Eve at the 1973 Sarah Siddons Awards

Gifted personal memorabilia to form the Bette Davis Collection at the Boston University since 1968

Co-wrote 2 autobiographies: The Lonely Life (1962) and This 'n That (1987)

Appeared in John Springer's "Legendary Ladies" series at The Town Hall in 1973

Presented the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 1974 Golden Globe Awards

Won the 1976 Saturn Award Best Supporting Actress

Is the first woman to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute in 1977

Received the 1980 Outstanding Mother of the Year Award from Woman's Day, the 1982 Award of Excellence from the Film Advisory Board, the Golden Reel Award from the National Film Society Artistry in Cinema, the Rudolph Valentino Award for Actress of the Year in 1982, the 1983 Charles Chaplin Award by UCLA Film and Television Archive, and the 1983 Women in Film Crystal Award

Received Life Achievement Awards from American Theater Arts in 1982, Boston Theater District in 1983, Council of Fashion Designers of America in 1986, and American Cinema Awards in 1989

Featured in songs, including Kim Carnes' Grammy-winning "Bette Davis Eyes" (1981)

Won the Golden Nymph at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival for A Piano for Mrs. Cimino (1982)

Awarded an Honorary César, appointed commander of Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1986, and granted a Fellowship by the British Film Institute and a Legion of Honour at Deauville Film Festival in 1987

Was the recipient of the 1987 Kennedy Center Honors Lifetime Achievement Award

Granted the 1988 Merit of Achievement by the Campione d'Italia and the 1989 Donostia Lifetime Achievement Award at the San Sebastián International Film Festival

Has had a memorial plaque in her birth home in Lowell since 1988

Honored by the Film Society of Lincoln Center Gala Tribute in 1989

Featured in the 1989 book Bette and Joan: The Divine Feud, the basis for the 2017 show Feud: Bette and Joan

Ranked #15 in Empire’s Top 100 Movie Stars in 1997; #10 in Entertainment Weekly’s 100 Greatest Movie Stars of All Time in 1998; #110 on VH1's "200 Greatest Pop Culture Icons of All Time" in 2003; #25 in Premiere's 50 Greatest Movie Stars of All Time in 2005 and #5 in 100 Greatest Performances of All Time in 2006 for All About Eve (1950)

Has the Bette Davis Foundation established in her honor in 1997 to award scholarships at Boston University

Named the 5th-greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema in 1999 by the American Film Institute

Inducted in the Online Film and Television Association Hall of Fame in 1999

Chosen in Variety magazine's 100 Icons of the Century in 2005

Honored as Turner Classic Movies Star of the Month for April 2008 and November 2019

Became the 14th star honored by US Postal Service's Legends of Hollywood stamp series in 2008

Has 2 stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: 6225 Hollywood Blvd for motion picture and 6233 Hollywood Blvd for TV

[hjellacott]

Why I decided to publish fanfiction "on demand"

A lot of noise going on in AO3 among my readers about my decision not to keep uploading content into AO3 unless there are readers asking for it, effectively publishing "on demand". Basically I keep writing (try to stop me) and I have for years, consistently, daily, but I no longer upload fanfics online, unless they're very requested, with very few exceptions. And I have also removed some fanfics from the online world. Even if some readers get pretty nasty about it all.

It's all for the same reasons:

Environmental impact:

1. Data centres, which host much of the online content, account for approximately 1-2% of global electricity usage, consuming an estimated 200-250 TWh of electricity per year. 2. According to the University of Massachusetts Lowell, the carbon footprint of the internet is estimated to be around 3.7% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

3. The production of electronic devices used in the digital infrastructure, such as servers, routers, and smartphones, generates about 50 million tons of e-waste annually, with only 20% being recycled properly. 4. The lifespan of some data centre equipment can be as short as 3-5 years, leading to a rapid turnover and accumulation of e-waste.

5. Data centres are estimated to consume approximately 200 million cubic meters of water per year globally, equivalent to the water usage of a small city. Some studies suggest that the water footprint of the internet could be as high as 15 litres per gigabyte of data transferred.

2. Time wasting: For me, writing is something I love doing. I absolutely love it, and I do it relentlessly, day after day, full stories. It took time to upload each story into the website, as you have to select the right chapter, copy, paste, add all warnings, add all necessary notes, fix any formatting issues, and so on, one chapter at a time. It's sometimes taken me over an hour to upload all of my stories, sometimes longer. But it was worth it when I saw the glee in the readers. But in the last few years, it isn't so pleasant. I am now a grown up adult with a whole life of my own, which makes it harder to find the hour/s to upload content.

3. Lack of response/engagement: And I go through all that just for what? nasty comments, or complete silence. It feels like nobody's reading, and so logically, I think, well if nobody's reading that's fine, time's change, I'm not hurt nor offended, but if nobody reads then uploading fanfics into the internet is an effective waste of my time that perhaps I could afford in the 2010s, but not any more. I've got far too many things to do. And since I'm still going to write the story and love that, I don't feel any need to post it, because I don't get any compensation from posting it.

Sometimes I even get grief for whatever I post, so what's the point?

[jcmarchi]

Entrepreneur creates career pathways with MIT OpenCourseWare

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/entrepreneur-creates-career-pathways-with-mit-opencourseware/

Entrepreneur creates career pathways with MIT OpenCourseWare

When June Odongo interviewed early-career electrical engineer Cynthia Wacheke for a software engineering position at her company, Wacheke lacked knowledge of computer science theory but showed potential in complex problem-solving.

Determined to give Wacheke a shot, Odongo turned to MIT OpenCourseWare to create a six-month “bridging course” modeled after the classes she once took as a computer science student. Part of MIT Open Learning, OpenCourseWare offers free, online, open educational resources from more than 2,500 courses that span the MIT undergraduate and graduate curriculum. 

“Wacheke had the potential and interest to do the work that needed to be done, so the way to solve this was for me to literally create a path for her to get that work done,” says Odongo, founder and CEO of Senga Technologies. 

Developers, Odongo says, are not easy to find. The OpenCourseWare educational resources provided a way to close that gap. “We put Wacheke through the course last year, and she is so impressive,” Odongo says. “Right now, she is doing our first machine learning models. It’s insane how good of a team member she is. She has done so much in such a short time.”

Making high-quality candidates job-ready

Wacheke, who holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Nairobi, started her professional career as a hardware engineer. She discovered a passion for software while working on a dashboard design project, and decided to pivot from hardware to software engineering. That’s when she discovered Senga Technologies, a logistics software and services company in Kenya catering to businesses that ship in Africa. 

Odongo founded Senga with the goal of simplifying and easing the supply chain and logistics experience, from the movement of goods to software tools. Senga’s ultimate goal, Odongo says, is to have most of their services driven by software. That means employees — and candidates — need to be able to think through complex problems using computer science theory.

“A lot of people are focused on programming, but we care less about programming and more about problem-solving,” says Odongo, who received a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and an MBA from Harvard Business School. “We actually apply the things people learn in computer science programs.”

Wacheke started the bridging course in June 2022 and was given six months to complete the curriculum on the MIT OpenCourseWare website. She took nine courses, including: Introduction to Algorithms; Mathematics for Computer Science; Design and Analysis of Algorithms; Elements of Software Construction; Automata, Computability, and Complexity; Database Systems; Principles of Autonomy and Decision Making; Introduction to Machine Learning; and Networks. 

“The bridging course helped me learn how to think through things,” Wacheke says. “It’s one thing to know how to do something, but it’s another to design that thing from scratch and implement it.”

During the bridging course, Wacheke was paired with a software engineer at Senga, who mentored her and answered questions along the way. She learned Ruby on Rails, a server-side web application framework under the MIT License. Wacheke also completed other projects to complement the theory she was learning. She created a new website that included an integration to channel external requests to Slack, a cross-platform team communication tool used by the company’s employees.

Continuous learning for team members

The bridging course concluded with a presentation to Senga employees, during which Wacheke explained how the company could use graph theory for decision-making. “If you want to get from point A to B, there are algorithms you can use to find the shortest path,” Wacheke says. “Since we’re a logistics company, I thought we could use this when we’re deciding which routes our trucks take.”

The presentation, which is the final requirement for the bridging course, is also a professional development opportunity for Senga employees. “This process is helpful for our team members, particularly those who have been out of school for a while,” Odongo says. “The candidates present what they’ve learned in relation to Senga. It’s a way of doing continuous learning for the existing team members.”

After successfully completing the bridging course in November 2022, Wacheke transitioned to a full-time software engineer role. She is currently developing a “machine” that can interpret and categorize hundreds of documents, including delivery notes, cash flows, and receipts.

“The goal is to enable our customers to simply feed those documents into our machine, and then we can more accurately read and convert them to digital formats to drive automation,” Odongo says. “The machine will also enable someone to ask a document a question, such as ‘What did I deliver to retailer X on date Y?’ or ‘What is the total price of the goods delivered?’”

The bridging course, which was initially custom-designed for Wacheke, is now a permanent program at Senga. A second team member completed the course in October 2023 and has joined the software team full time. 

“Developers are not easy to find, and you also want high-quality developers,” Odongo says. “At least when we do this, we know that the person has gone through what we need.”

[bidotorg]

Born on This Day: Jack Kerouac! Jack Kerouac, the bisexual literary icon known for his groundbreaking work in the Beat Generation, wasn't just a pioneer in literature—he also played football. Jack Kerouac's football history is an intriguing aspect of his life that often surprises many fans of his literary work. Before he became a renowned writer, Kerouac had a brief but noteworthy stint as a football player. Kerouac was an exceptional athlete during his high school years in Lowell, Massachusetts. He played as a running back for Lowell High School's football team and quickly gained a reputation for his speed, agility, and toughness on the field. His talent caught the attention of college recruiters, and he received offers to play football at several universities. In 1939, Kerouac enrolled at Columbia University on a football scholarship. He joined the Columbia Lions football team and played as a reserve running back during his freshman year. However, his football career at Columbia was short-lived due to a combination of factors, including injuries and conflicts with the coaching staff. #MarchMadness

🏈

[navigatingneurodivergence]

I've been so busy in recent weeks preparing for participation in Wednesday's Employment and Education in Neurodiversity Webinar hosted by UMass Lowell's Center for Autism Research and Education (CARE) and Neurodiversity Horizons (NDH), taking place this Wednesday April 5, 2023 from 6-7 p.m. EST via Zoom!! At this event, I will be among a panel of neurodivergent advocates who will talk about our experiences as they relate to navigating neurodiversity within higher education and into the workplace. It's free, and everyone is welcome to join!

For more information and how to register, see below:

University of Massachusetts Lowell Center for Autism Research and Education (CARE) and Neurodiversity Horizons are collaborating to host an Employment and Education in Neurodiversity Webinar! We are bringing together a panel of neurodiverse advocates to talk about their experiences regarding employment and higher education. Neurodiversity is a rising advocacy, and we encourage everyone to join and learn about making our world more inclusive. Many autistic adults are unemployment or underemployment, including those with a college degree. This is an important problem that we need to fix by battling the stigma against neurodiversity. To learn more about this and make our world a better place, join us on April 5th 6-7 p.m. EST on Zoom! You will receive the Zoom link when you register for the event.

Please feel free to contact Ashleigh Hillier by email: ashleigh_hillier@uml.edu with any questions.

#neurodiversity #education #research #work #career #school #webinar #employment #highereducation #psychology #nd #growth #navigatingneurodivergence

[spngirlpolls]

i have never seen another person talk about the show wings. so thank you lol i voted for that

yay! anon i love wings so much i own the box set (bc i am a physical media nerd)

here’s my pitch for wings for those of you who haven’t seen it: wings is an ensemble workplace comedy that about two pilot brothers, goofy slacker Brian and uptight Joe, who run a small airline in the island of Nantucket, Massachusetts. There’s also aspiring musician and childhood best friend Helen, who runs the lunch counter at the airport, kooky elderly flight attendant Faye, endearingly dim witted plane mechanic Lowell (played by Thomas Haden Church), and rival airline owner Roy. Later seasons feature other additional cast, most notably cab driver Antonio, played by Tony Shalhoub (from Monk, Marvelous Ms. Maisel, etc)

wings also takes place in the same universe as both cheers and fraiser, with characters from both of those shows making crossover appearances. it also has one of the most peaceful theme songs/intro sequences of all time (here)

if you enjoy 90s sitcoms like seinfeld, friends, fraiser, and the nanny, give wings a shot! it’s on hulu in the us.

[emwheezie]

Oc lore! 2/2 Check out the post on Lennon here

This story follows the friendship of Lennon and Dimitri as they take the world head on, trying to make music together. The story is based in Cambridge/Somerville Massachusetts in 2009.

Dimitri Wretzky (born October 3 1983) studied law at Boston University. After college, he didn't do anything with his degree and moved to Somerville, MA with his girlfriend Meg. (Don't worry about her, she's not relevant AT ALL... they break up before the comic starts). He's the type of person who constantly needs attention and is almost never without a girlfriend or boyfriend. (He's Bi). 

Dimitri grew up in Lowell, MA and attended a Catholic high school, Unlike Lennon, Dimitri has a pretty decent relationship with his parents.

He's super smart, book smart and emotionally smart. He is a talented writer and poet and great at marketing himself and bringing ideas to life. He's big into punk and hardcore music, (though his parents think this means he only really listens to Green Day). Dimitri picked up the bass guitar cause he thought it'd be the easiest to learn... it was not easy. Lennon tries to help him out a lot and he's supposed to improve throughout the comic. While Lennon really cares about the music, Dimitri's just hyped up to be in a band and live that kind of life.

Dimitri believes nothing is accidental and everything he does has purpose. Everything has a reason behind it, even if he has to look a little deeper to find it's meaning.

Dimitri's world is shook when he meets Oli LaBlanc by accident one day. (I'm not gonna get too much into Oli right now, but just know he's a photographer/videographer and graphic designer from NY who is living in the Boston area for work)

The two hit it off right away and become quick friends... Maybe even more...

In a group of friends, Dimitri would probably be called the mom friend. He's kind and caring and his emotional intelligence gets him far. People love Dimitri for his friendly and upbeat demeanor and think he's the best looking of the group. He's the type of dude that could really get anything he wants out of life. Unfortunately, Dimitri has a streak of self sabotage.

Dimitri often puts others before him. His main priority is making sure his friends are happy and doing well, especially his best friend Lennon. The two of them work really well together, they're like perfect fitting but opposite puzzle pieces. They're two dudes you probably wouldn't expect to be friends by appearance alone.

Dimitri also picks up crochet at one point... But that's getting into spoiler territory. Heheheh

[mariacallous]

While Democrats have traditionally claimed education as a motivating issue for their base, bolstered by long-lasting support for public schools and deep ties with teachers unions, the ground has, in recent election cycles, started to shift. Republicans on the state and federal levels have recently seized some territory for themselves, transforming it into a winning topic for their own voters.

Naturally, education has long been a cultural flashpoint, with politicians capitalizing on fears of youth indoctrination for decades. But a maelstrom of modern factors—among them discontent instigated by the coronavirus pandemic, backlash to a recent reckoning on racial injustice and transforming concepts of gender identity, and savvy political attunement to the electoral power of grievance—have given the idea of parental rights renewed salience.

“At the root of this, parents’ love and concern for their kids is the most powerful force in education,” said Jon Valant, director of the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institute. “That can be used for good, or it can be exploited.”

Public schools are particularly susceptible to political attacks because of their massive reach, and because it is nearly impossible for adults to truly know what is occurring within school walls, said Jack Schneider, associate professor of education at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. “Schools are places where we are both literally and metaphorically making the future,” Schneider said. “So if you want to make an argument about the American way of life being under threat, then saying, ‘These evildoers have a plot to use the schools to turn young people against America,’ that’s a pretty frightening prospect for people.”

That prospect has shaped American politics from as far back as the nineteenth century, when debates over which version of the Bible should be taught in schools erupted into violence. In 1925, the infamous Scopes trial centered on whether the principles of evolution could be taught in public schools. As the twentieth century progressed, some parents feared Communist infiltration in schools at the height of the Cold War; later, conservative Christian parents in particular resisted the implementation of comprehensive sexual education.

“This idea of parental rights, and you’re seeing it emerge again right now, is one that has long been with us on the conservative side,” said Melissa Deckman, CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute, who wrote a book about the Christian right’s influence in school board elections at the end of the twentieth century.

Those parental anxieties have been rekindled in part by the Covid-19 pandemic, which saw many schools across the country closed for an extended period of time. Anger over lengthy school closures crossed party lines, making Democratic politicians reluctant to “engage on issues of education,” said Valant, as the party feared political backlash. Republicans gained ground during this period, in large part because they successfully portrayed themselves as the party that wanted to return kids to in-person schooling.

Ideological disagreements about the pandemic curdled political rhetoric on education and invited heightened discourse over what is being taught when schools are open. Critical race theory, an educational framework for understanding how racial discrimination is embedded in American social and political systems, has increasingly become a boogeyman of the right and a purported example of indoctrination in public schools. “In no way is [critical race theory] inherently connected to pandemic school closures, but the shutdowns have changed the settings in which politics are happening in schools right now,” said Valant.

The election of Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin in 2021 was a sign of how education issues could factor into politics. Youngkin had highlighted the idea of parental rights in his campaign, a deliberately vague yet useful framework for earning support from generally disgruntled parents.

Controlling public education has remained a rallying cry for other Republicans, perhaps most notably Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, who successfully established the idea that something nefarious was happening in public schools under a nebulous aegis of loosely connected political concepts—parental rights, the cultural backlash to the racial justice protests in the summer of 2020, and the increased acceptance and visibility of transgender Americans among them. Outrage, politically manufactured and otherwise, regarding mask mandates and school closures snowballed into the larger “politics of grievance” that Schneider argued has characterized Republican politics.

“It’s like a diet entirely made of sugar,” said Schneider. “There’s a kind of instant rush of feeling like you are finally being heard and that you get to give voice to your outrage and your anger. The problem is, it just doesn’t actually lead to anything, at least not anything positive and substantive for those who are aggrieved.”

Social media has also played a mobilizing and radicalizing role in the fight over what is taught in public schools. In the battles over school boards in the 1990s, Deckman said, conservative Christian parents became invested through their churches, whereas now “social media has galvanized people on the far right” to become involved.

The annual PRRI American Values Survey, released this October, found that 92 percent of Americans believe that their children should be taught the good and bad aspects of American history, as opposed to omitting portions that might make them feel uncomfortable or guilty. The poll also found that while 66 percent of Americans think public school teachers provide students with appropriate curricula that teach the good and bad of American history, 29 percent overall believe that teachers and librarians are indoctrinating children. But the majority of Republicans, 54 percent, believe that teachers and librarians are indoctrinating students with “inappropriate curricula and books that wrongly portray America as a racist country.”

That divide is even starker in red states. In recent months, several Republican-led states have considered or approved legislation education purported to expand parental oversight and protect children, but which would also limit what is taught in schools and determine how vulnerable populations of children are treated. These bills range from preventing transgender students from using bathrooms that match their gender identity, to notifying parents if their children begin using different pronouns or expressing questions about gender identity, to barring transgender athletes from participating in girls’ or women’s sports. DeSantis’s administration is moving to expand Florida’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” law, initially prohibiting discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms through third grade, to also apply to fourth through twelfth grades.

Florida’s Department of Education also rejected an advanced placement class on African American studies, and the state’s laws restricting lessons about racism, sexual orientation, and gender identity have led to teacher confusion and the removal of books from school libraries and classrooms. Twenty-six states banned or opened investigations into more than 1,100 books between July 2021 to March 2022, amid the spate of state laws restricting lessons on race and racism, sexual orientation, gender identity.

Meanwhile, on the federal level, the Republican majority in the House of Representatives narrowly passed a “Parents’ Bill of Rights” last week, which would increase parental oversight of their children’s public education. The bill would require local school systems to provide information on book lists, curricula, incidents of violence, and whether their child uses another name or pronouns within school walls. Representative Julia Letlow, the bill’s sponsor, argued that it was “not an attempt to have Congress dictate curriculum, or determine the books in the library,” but instead “aims to bring more transparency and accountability to education, allowing parents to be informed.”

It squeaked through the House with opposition from a few Republicans and all Democrats, and is unlikely to be considered in the Democratic-controlled Senate, making the legislation primarily effective as a messaging document. Approving the bill had been a key campaign pledge for House Republicans ahead of the 2022 midterm elections as part of their “Commitment to America” platform.

But it is unlikely that such ideologically tilted legislation regarding parental rights could be implemented in blue states or on the federal level. Moreover, there is danger of overreach and backlash. The Parents’ Bill of Rights did not earn universal support from Republicans in the House largely because it would involve such direct federal government involvement in education, which is theoretically antithetical to the conservative view of education.

Moreover, policies such as removing books from school libraries could ultimately invite backlash from parents. “If left to the logical conclusion that you want to completely remove anything talking about race or gay people from schools, I just don’t think it’s possible in the twenty-first century,” Deckman said. Views about gender and sexuality in particular have changed dramatically since the ’90s, and the social media trends that have galvanized the right have also mobilized the parents of LGBTQ children who do not want to see their children targeted.

And while targeting gender-affirming care for children may be red meat for the Republican base, it may not gain purchase among the larger American public. DeSantis was reelected by wide margins, but other candidates who emphasized education-related battlefronts in the culture wars were less successful. (Indeed, many of the candidates that Youngkin endorsed and stumped for—highlighting his own victory as champion of parental rights—fell in their elections.)

Schneider also argued that traditionally Republican constituencies might eventually be frustrated by policies that divert funding from their own public schools in favor of vouchers for private institutions. “Rural white people who overwhelmingly vote for Republicans, and who were and remain majority Trump supporters, those folks are not going to be pleased when their local public schools disappear,” Schneider said. “It also won’t be very appealing to conservative white suburbanites when the schools that they often are quite proud of for a variety of reasons begin to suffer, because funding begins to be slashed.”

Polling also shows that while Americans may be pessimistic about the state of public education in general, they are often pleased with the schooling that their own children are receiving. According to an NPR/Ipsos survey released last April, 88 percent of respondents said “my child’s teacher(s) have done the best they could, given the circumstances around the pandemic.” Strikingly, 76 percent of respondents agreed that “my child’s school does a good job keeping me informed about the curriculum, including potentially controversial topics.” A September Gallup poll found that, although only 42 percent of Americans were satisfied with the country’s education system, 80 percent of parents with children are completely or somewhat satisfied with their oldest child’s education.

Voters have traditionally trusted Democrats more on issues of education, although that gap narrowed in the wake of the pandemic. Valant argued that, as anger around the school closures fades into memory, education will become less of a salient issue for Republicans. “We very rarely have a sort of extended period where it seems like Republicans see more political advantage in education nationwide than Democrats do. And I do think that is a product of our immediate situation, and I don’t think that’ll last forever,” Valant said. A poll released by the National Parents Union last week found that parents trust Democrats more than Republicans to formulate a parental “bill of rights.”

In the short term, however, Republican-led states will likely continue to champion their concept of parental rights, and implement policies that fall within that framework, even if they are unable to gain traction nationwide. “I think there will be five years of real political victories for the right that come at a very steep cost once Americans catch on to what the real consequences of that will be,” Schneider said.