What better time than the summer holiday, to read and to ponder? :)
Was recently asked about self-review of relevance in pedagogy; it is a constant progress, obviously? No, actually; many a science department continue to use dated, dubious "resources" derived from a certain well-known commercial website. The consequential question arises: allocation of time to review and produce new pedagogical resources. So much for the summer to "switch-off"... Anyway, rsc have publised a policy document 'Future workforce and educational pathways', which purports to predict a disproportionate higher demand for chemistry skills. Thoughts of "(s)he who pays the piper, plays the tune", come to mind. Whilst of interest to speculate at a national scale, relevance to London students may be more valuable at a regional scale; e.g. London is not a significant part of manufacture sector, so any projection of demand growth that is related to manufacturing may not be seen in opportunities vacant. Such data would be useful to help make a school scheme of work relevant to the local context. With luck, the imminent conclusion to the extant curriculum, assessment review will give further justification to change.
Similar questions about curriculum relevance have been made elsewhere, for example in the field of dismal scienceeconomics, about fitness for purpose.
human line judges get around eight per cent of calls wrong. But there was one obvious advantage of the old hybrid system that was dispensed with this year. If we estimate that humans are around 92 per cent accurate, and robots around 98 per cent accurate, then a belt-and-braces system involving both should be 99.84 per cent accurate.(source, Daily Telegraph) Surely should be product of errors, for total approximately 90 %? (someone, please correct as appropriate! :))
It has (not) been a surprise that the scientific community continue to remain silent about the assassination of scientists in Iran. To maintain a perspective that knowledge is reserved for a self-appointed select few, is a remnant of colonialist hegemony. A quick web search revealed some fortunate resistance to this narrative.
From a simple url (accessible to all) to a proprietary "there's an app for that" mentality, announcement of the closure of 'bbc sounds' does not surprise. The annoyance to hear constant promotion of the proprietary software"app" is a repeat of the "walled garden" business strategy that is now well established. Expect subscription to the "app" as the next stage of international commercialisation of BBC content. To be fair, the do not pay the so-called licence fee, so this seems a logical conclusion.
