Science Education & Policy

One fundamental myth of gifted education is "you can't put all the smart kids together, because the less-smart need the smarties around to challenge the others". You can reword that as "it's okay to drag down the smarter kids for ...

Article - Alex "Sandy" Antunes - Jul 29 2011 - 10:00am

What Model Works Best for Meet the Scientist Programs?

Over the past several years, a growing number of trade associations, foundations and science and engineering companies have started major efforts to get scientists into schools and hopefully inspire students with what they do. The goal, of course, is to ge ...

Blog Post - Aimee Stern - Jul 31 2011 - 10:43am

Classroom Display Boards: The Result

Picture the scene: you are about to start in a new school as a science teacher. The pupils are due back in one week. You have lessons to plan and resources to prepare. You walk into your lab for the first time and see, with a sinking feeling, that the dis ...

Article - Daniel Chapman - Aug 31 2011 - 12:48pm

California Science Center Has To Pay Fee To Not Show Intelligent Design Film

A documentary on Intelligent Design, a flavor of Creationism, can be shown at the California Science Center under terms of a settlement announced yesterday. But the group that sued the center after they scheduled a screening of "Darwin's Dilemma: ...

Blog Post - Hank Campbell - Sep 2 2011 - 7:34pm

America- Still The Place To Be For Science

Despite the self-loathing of progressives in American science academia, America is a pretty good place to be, even after 15 years of onerous visa restrictions that have made it difficult to hire the best people and forces immigrants educated here to return ...

Blog Post - Hank Campbell - Sep 10 2011 - 12:47pm

Home Schooling Gets An A+ In Canada

Can professional teachers in a crowded classroom hobbled by arcane government policies teach kids well? Probably, in most cases, but institutionalized education and their unions have gone to war against any changes to the status quo, even when the status ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Sep 9 2011 - 4:00am

Teaching Energy: Prepare for War

There is a bloody and brutal battle being wagered in schools. Science departments are split down the middle. It's friend vs friend and the future of our children's education rests on the outcome. Or so the educational literature would have you b ...

Blog Post - Daniel Chapman - Sep 10 2011 - 8:21am

Can Cheerleaders Successfully Market Science?

www.sciencecheerleader.com, an organization started by the dynamic and committed citizen scientist Darlene Cavalier, has a noble goal. It wants to demonstrate to young girls that it’s OK to be pretty, smart, and love science. In fact, all of the cheerleade ...

Blog Post - Aimee Stern - Sep 13 2011 - 10:44am

How To Take Your Squid Home

I must have missed that section in the What to Expect books on how to react when your child comes home from school with a Ziploc bag filled with squid parts in his backpack. Thus begins an entertaining account by Beth Braccio in the Chicago Parent abo ...

Article - Danna Staaf - Sep 14 2011 - 10:54pm

Perimeter Institute Recruits Xiao-Gang Wen To BMO Financial Group Newton Isaac Chair

Xiao-Gang Wen, a condensed matter theoretical physicist, has joined the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics as the new BMO Financial Group Isaac Newton Chair. Yes, their Isaac Newton Chair has a corporate sponsor. Xiao-Gang Wen is moving from M ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 18 2011 - 11:06pm