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Author: adaptiman

A Positive View of the World

I’m loving a recent post by Inc. Magazine profiling Bill Gates new favorite book, Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker. While I haven’t read the book yet, the review points out that the book takes a very positive view of the future of world while providing leadership advice to focus on positive progress rather than problems. This is a very different vibe from the dystopic view that we are seeing in media and entertainment, and for that reason alone, I want to read it. The book also reviews several cognitive biases that affect our world view.

January 30, 2018

Students of the Future

EDUCAUSE recently published their five most popular videos of 2017. One that caught my eye was Students of the Future. This is great summary of where higher ed technology trends are taking us. The video emphasizes the following “hot topics.”

Slow Death of Traditional Degrees

While the “sheepskin” in higher ed will still be around for awhile, educational documentation will more frequently take the form of competencies and mastery of skills demonstrated in a variety of ways. The “credentials” of a student will be a collection of “requirements, artifacts, and other evidence of learning competencies” that the student will control rather than the institution. Educational paths of study will become increasingly customizable. The means that the role and impact of traditional degrees will change and diminish.

Predictive Analytics

We’re already seeing a trend here. Universities (including mine) are scrambling to figure out how to 1) generate predictive analytics and 2) use them. We see a subcategory of this being applied to “informed advising” and at TAMU, this is the tip of the spear for analytics. I believe we are at the advent of this topic, and it will take a while to mature this area.

Broadening of Student Demographics

The definition of the “traditional” student is broadening. We must increase our diversity, equity, and inclusion, otherwise, the market will leave us and go to other educational settings that are more agile.

January 17, 2018

Low Code to No Code

For several years, I’ve been hearing about low-code platforms. These are usually web-based tools such as QuickBase, Appian, and others that focus mainly on the professional developer market and promise to speed up the development process. The disruption created by this model of Software Defined Everything (SDX) has become increasingly evident. But up to now, I’ve thought that our professional developers have been safe. We are still using more traditional platforms like DotNet and Python to develop web-based apps.

Now I’m hearing about no-code platforms that are targeting non-professional application developers – so-called “citizen coders.” For example Techcrunch published an article today on Zeroqode, an up-and-coming no-code vendor. At CES this week, we’ve also seen an explosion of AI driven bots that are doing all kinds of things. It is these two disruptive factors, low code/no code and AI, that lead me to believe we may have reached a tipping point in software development. I think the nature of our profession is going to dramatically change in the next few years, traditional programming will becoming increasingly obsolete, and our skillset as IT professionals will continue to shift toward professional services – that is, translating the needs of our customers into technology solutions through project management, business analysis, and business relationship management. This is the part they don’t understand very well, and our professional experience can be used to guide them. As we see a new generation of citizen coders that have little formal training in development, where does that leave the professionals?

January 12, 2018

First Freedom

A recent article reported that most college students believe that offensive speech is not protected by the Constitution. Of those surveyed, 44% answered that offensive speech is not protected while 39% answered correctly that the Constitution protects offensive speech. I guess the other 17% didn’t know, which is almost as bad. 62% agreed that campus groups hosting an event are legally required to supply a speaker with the opposite view point. Huh?

It is beyond scary to me the lack of understanding of our Constitution that young people have. I suspect that older generations have a marginally better understanding, but suspect that much of the citizens of our great country don’t understand the bedrock document of our nation. I believe we have a duty to teach the Constitution to others.

January 7, 2018

Social Media Effects

I’ve often wondered about the effects of social media use. My roles as a technology manager, professor, observer of human behavior, and parent put the topic of social media squarely in my sights. I recently read an excellent article from the BBC on the effects of social media use, and while it was not scholarly, it summarizes much of the current research.

Does Twitter cause anxiety or let us cope with it better? Do people’s moods increase or decrease after using social media? Does use of social media cause depression? It’s interesting because much of the scholarly research is inconclusive and contradictory. While I haven’t gone to the source articles (yet), I’m curious why we don’t have a solid base of literature on this topic considering the massive amount of time the billions of our people spend on it. Is our lack of curiosity because we are afraid of the answer?

I walk across campus and have to dodge students who have their noses in their devices as they walk. Virtually ALL of them are engrossed in the latest tweet or Facebook posts from their friends. I wonder what this behavior, which appears to be an addiction, is doing to their young minds. My experience is that most of what is published on social media is banal minutiae, which creates another question – WHY?

Microsoft developed some tools to analyze Twitter profiles for depressive language, linguistic style, engagement and emotion and were able to predict depression prior to symptoms in seven out of ten cases. That’s pretty good if true. After I finish my dissertation this semester, this may be a topic that I would like to pick up and study further. There may be some interesting ways to collect data on this topic using “apps.” Hmm.

January 7, 2018

French Agreement

Well, the netherworld must be cold today, because I found something on which I agree with the French. This article about banning supermarkets from throwing away food is a wonderful idea and a great use of legislation to help combat hunger, not only in our country, but worldwide.

According to the article, France, which receives top marks for food sustainability, throws away 234 pounds of food per capita per year while the U.S. almost doubles that at 430 pounds per capita per year. Worldwide, we throw away one-third of all food produced. ONE-THIRD!!! How is it that we haven’t addressed this issue?

Certainly, I agree that some food that could be dangerous because of spoilage should not be shared or distributed. But I suspect that’s not the case for a majority of the food tossed. There is a difference between expired and dangerous. I wonder if it’s possible to create legislation that is simple, and could distinguish between them?

January 7, 2018

Vote for the Fun for All Park in College Station

Want to do something nice for the community where it costs you nothing and takes only a few seconds? The College Station Noon Lions Club is supporting the Fun for All Play Ground in Central Park in College Station (http://funforallplaygroundbcs.com/). The Fun for All park is playground specially designed for people of all abilities to enjoy playing outdoors. It has to be one of the nicest, best ideas I have come across in a long time.

Guaranty Bank is running a contest to support charities across Texas. The project that gets the most votes gets the most support. So far, the Fun for All Park is leading in votes but we need your vote. So click the link below and vote for the Fun for All Park. You can vote once per day!

http://bit.ly/givesback2017

December 15, 2017

The Politics of Contraception

Here we go again! As usual, The Times is overplaying the point.

“In the lawsuit, filed by the state of Pennsylvania, the judge said the rule would cause irreparable harm because tens of thousands of women would lose contraceptive coverage.”

Within the context of this article, “losing contraceptive coverage” doesn’t mean women wouldn’t have access to it. Rather it means they must pay for it themselves instead of having other citizens pay for it. How much are we talking about? In my health plan, the prescription co-pay (after deductible) would be $15 for three months. For Medicaid recipients, there is no deductible, and the co-pay is $4. Putting aside the reasonableness of all of our citizens being responsible for their own medication, do these amounts of money sound like they would cause “irreparable harm to tens of thousands of women?”

95% of US Citizens have mobile phones and pay at least $30/month for service. If contraception is as critical as the media portrays, and losing free contraception would cause “irreparable harm,” dare I suggest it would be reasonable for those who can’t afford contraception to give up their mobile service in order to pay for it? What it sounds like is The Times is making an argument citizens have a right to free contraception. I’m pretty sure that’s not in The Constitution.

“It is difficult to imagine a rule that ‘intrudes more into the lives of women.’”

Huh? Expecting citizens to pay for their healthcare is intruding into their lives? I don’t want to intrude on anyone’s life. But it’s OK for them to reach into my pocket to pay for something I find morally wrong? That sounds like the intrusion is on the other foot.

From The New York Times: Court Temporarily Blocks Trump Order Against Contraceptive Coverage

December 15, 2017