The Fora: A Higher Education Community

Students don't know that the words "delve," "tapestry," and/or "whilst" in an essay send professors straight to the AI-generation detector.

Good morning!

Got the pangram right away but just now got to genius.  Yesterday husband got QBABH, but it took him forever to get the pangram (which I thought was a terrible one... is that really a word?!).  He helped me with mayo, edema, dammed.

I also got wrung-goldfish, finally, at the end of the day.

Happy solving!

Grading and T1.

Quote from: apl68 on Today at 07:26:52 AM

Quote from: dismalist on April 17, 2024, 03:01:56 PM

Quote from: apl68 on April 17, 2024, 02:35:32 PMDon't know much about the Columbia situation, but evidently things have gotten pretty hot on campus there over the issue.  One has to feel sorry for their leadership caught up in this.  At least their head has so far learned lessons from the spectacular career suicide that occurred over at Harvard.

The leadership of Columbia has allowed Columbia behavior. No people to feel sorry for.

The lesson, rather, is, that the incentives facing university administrators are to let local interest groups run wild, the consequences be damned. No skin off the admins' back. Or, there's too much money around! :-)

There's not any way for admins to prevent (or not) controversial speech and activism on campus when passions on an issue are running this high without seriously offending somebody.  It's a no-win situation for them.  I can't help feeling sorry for admins confronted with a situation like this, even if I don't agree with particular aspects of their handling of it.  At least if they show some common sense in the process.

So, colleges are lawless realms.

Thanks for the responses apl68, marshwiggle, and Liquidambar. I needed a good laugh today :)

Quote from: Wahoo Redux on April 17, 2024, 07:38:38 PM

Quote from: dismalist on April 17, 2024, 03:01:56 PM

Quote from: apl68 on April 17, 2024, 02:35:32 PMDon't know much about the Columbia situation, but evidently things have gotten pretty hot on campus there over the issue.  One has to feel sorry for their leadership caught up in this.  At least their head has so far learned lessons from the spectacular career suicide that occurred over at Harvard.

The leadership of Columbia has allowed Columbia behavior. No people to feel sorry for.

The lesson, rather, is, that the incentives facing university administrators are to let local interest groups run wild, the consequences be damned. No skin off the admins' back. Or, there's too much money around! :-)

How does college leadership "allow" this kind of behavior?  How does one stop "local interest groups" from "running wild" on a college campus?

Half the time I don't know what you are talking about, Big-D.

There's not any way for admins to prevent (or not) controversial speech and activism on campus when passions on an issue are running this high without seriously offending somebody.  It's a no-win situation for them.  I can't help feeling sorry for admins confronted with a situation like this, even if I don't agree with particular aspects of their handling of it.  At least if they show some common sense in the process.

Quote from: Langue_doc on April 16, 2024, 01:39:04 PM

QuoteNPR Suspends Editor Whose Essay Criticized the Broadcaster
Uri Berliner, a senior business editor at NPR, said the public radio network's liberal bias had tainted its coverage of important stories.

Uri Berliner's article in The Free Press. Toward the end of the article, Berliner writes:

QuoteRace and identity became paramount in nearly every aspect of the workplace. Journalists were required to ask everyone we interviewed their race, gender, and ethnicity (among other questions), and had to enter it in a centralized tracking system. We were given unconscious bias training sessions. A growing DEI staff offered regular meetings imploring us to "start talking about race." Monthly dialogues were offered for "women of color" and "men of color." Nonbinary people of color were included, too.

These initiatives, bolstered by a $1 million grant from the NPR Foundation, came from management, from the top down. Crucially, they were in sync culturally with what was happening at the grassroots—among producers, reporters, and other staffers. Most visible was a burgeoning number of employee resource (or affinity) groups based on identity.

They included MGIPOC (Marginalized Genders and Intersex People of Color mentorship program); Mi Gente (Latinx employees at NPR); NPR Noir (black employees at NPR); Southwest Asians and North Africans at NPR; Ummah (for Muslim-identifying employees); Women, Gender-Expansive, and Transgender People in Technology Throughout Public Media; Khevre (Jewish heritage and culture at NPR); and NPR Pride (LGBTQIA employees at NPR).

All this reflected a broader movement in the culture of people clustering together based on ideology or a characteristic of birth. If, as NPR's internal website suggested, the groups were simply a "great way to meet like-minded colleagues" and "help new employees feel included," it would have been one thing.

But the role and standing of affinity groups, including those outside NPR, were more than that. They became a priority for NPR's union, SAG-AFTRA—an item in collective bargaining. The current contract, in a section on DEI, requires NPR management to "keep up to date with current language and style guidance from journalism affinity groups" and to inform employees if language differs from the diktats of those groups. In such a case, the dispute could go before the DEI Accountability Committee.

In essence, this means the NPR union, of which I am a dues-paying member, has ensured that advocacy groups are given a seat at the table in determining the terms and vocabulary of our news coverage.

Conflicts between workers and bosses, between labor and management, are common in workplaces. NPR has had its share. But what's notable is the extent to which people at every level of NPR have comfortably coalesced around the progressive worldview.

And this, I believe, is the most damaging development at NPR: the absence of viewpoint diversity.

Uri Berliner has resigned.

QuoteNPR Editor Who Accused Broadcaster of Liberal Bias Resigns
Uri Berliner, who has worked at NPR for 25 years, said in an essay last week that the nonprofit had allowed progressive bias to taint its coverage.

Quote from: Liquidambar on Today at 07:11:31 AM

Quote from: EdnaMode on Today at 06:14:06 AMDoes he really think he should earn points because he didn't intend to do it incorrectly? Ugh. I've heard a lot of excuses over the years, but this at least is a new spin on things.

I didn't intend for that bridge I designed to fall down...

I didn't intend to adjust that torque wrench using the wrong units, and apply sixteen times the specified amount of torque, and twist the heads off all those bolts on the engine (True story shared by a vocational-technical teacher of my acquaintance).

Good morning!

QB--found one tricky word early on, and had to rely on BB for the last two. QB yesterday, with ammo and mode as my last finds.

Happy solving!

Quote from: Liquidambar on Today at 07:11:31 AM

Quote from: EdnaMode on Today at 06:14:06 AMDoes he really think he should earn points because he didn't intend to do it incorrectly? Ugh. I've heard a lot of excuses over the years, but this at least is a new spin on things.

I didn't intend for that bridge I designed to fall down...

I guess Stu is unaware of the road surface on the way to Hell.