Reed's Ruminations: The Past, Present, and Future
Reflections on science, technology, and computing — leavened by personal experience
Tag: Education
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Explaining Science and Engineering
As I have followed the international news regarding the Japanese disaster, I have been struck by the challenges each news organization has faced in explaining technical concepts. We live in a technological society, where understanding of scientific processes and engineering design balances are essential to informed debate and decision making.
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America COMPETES Passage
My Microsoft colleague, Elizabeth Grossman, has posted a thoughtful essay on today’s passage of America Creating Opportunities to Meaningfully Promote Excellence in Technology, Education, and Science (COMPETES) Reauthorization Act of 2010 by the U.S. Congress.
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Social Leadership: Empty Seats at the Table
In the Information Age, computing researchers are well placed to be bilingual, translating computing technology trends and capabilities into the language understood by policy makers and other influentials, and, in turn, relating policy desires to other researchers. However, I am repeatedly struck by the relatively small number of computing researchers who are engaged in the…
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Doctoral Comedy: Which Way Is The Door?
The first time I saw the PhDComics strip, I knew the artist must have been a Ph.D. student, because only someone who has experienced graduate school and faculty life, particularly in a technical discipline, could have that much insight regarding the joy and misery of graduate student life and the trials and foibles of faculty…
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Extraordinary Times, Challenges and Opportunities
The American research university has changed radically and repeatedly over the past century. It emerged from Cold War as a government-funded instrument of social change, economic competitiveness and national security. There is no reason, indeed ample precedent to the contrary, to believe that it will not continue to evolve rapidly and radically. The current culture…
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Rikei Banare and Global Competition
On Saturday, May 17, the New York Times ran a front page story (below the fold) on the dearth of Japanese students entering science and engineering fields. Japanese universities call it rikei banare or “flight from science.”