How do you know it’s spring where you live? What sights, sounds, smells, feelings or other signs tell you spring has arrived? Have you noticed any traces of the season in your community yet?
Do you look forward to the arrival of spring each year? Why or why not?
Tell us in the comments then read the related Opinion piece to learn about the birds, plants and traditions that signal the coming of spring in this writer’s neighborhood.
Find many more ways to use our Picture Prompt feature in this lesson plan.
We were in the city’s massive U.S. Space and Rocket Center, a museum chronicling the work of the nearby NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, where every major development in spacecraft technology took place for decades.
Mr. Moore now volunteers here as a NASA emeritus Docent at the Center. Clad in a white lab coat, he talks to visitors under the shadow of a Saturn V rocket he helped build. He was reassigned to the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center when it was established in 1958. His job was to build a rocket to get people into space, instead of one that could reach Moscow in a single flight.
Draw a line down the middle of a blank piece of paper. On the left side, write: “I am a male in society. Being a man means …” On the right side, “I am a female in society. Being a woman means …”
Take several minutes to write at least 5 sentences for each column.
Now, compare the two lists: How are they similar? How are they different? Are they helpful guides for male or female behavior? Or, do you feel they are somehow limiting?
Where do you think these ideas about what it means to be a man or woman come from? Are we born with them or are they learned?
Early in my first go at being a father, I was hijacked by ancient impulses. Our family lived in a rowhouse neighborhood in Philadelphia, and right down the street was a small playground where gangs of boys gathered for games of stickball and basketball. My son loved playing sports. But he was unprepared for what developed as his friends grew older.
After years together laughing and riding their tricycles and then bikes up and down the block, several of the boys grew angry and mean. Ultimately, they turned on my son, taunting him, leaving him out of their games. He began to trudge home, tail between his legs. And I felt called to action.
At first, I tried to bolster his confidence so he would give the playground another go. But one Saturday morning I met him at the front steps and told him he could not come into the house. “You have to figure this out,” I said. “I’ll stay with you as long as you need, but I cannot let you just give up.”
He tried to push past me, his humiliation becoming frantic. He melted down, screaming and crying. I kept saying: “You can do it. You don’t have to give up.” A neighbor poked her head out, concerned about what must have sounded like child abuse.
Did I do the right thing? Even now I’m not sure. He did go back to the playground, and eventually managed some kind of truce with the other kids. He grew up into a fine man, a teacher, and understands I was trying to help, in my clumsy way. But while teaching him to stand up for himself, was I also passing along the prejudice that a boy should override his pain and never back down from a fight?
He continues:
What happened in my son’s peer group was perfectly predictable. Boyhood immerses boys in violence and the bullying that leads to it. High school boys are more likely than girls to have been in a physical fight in the past year and male children are more likely to have been victims of violence. Three types of male violence — violence against women, violence against other men and violence against themselves — are deeply interwoven.
Violence springs from what boys learn about what it means to be a man. One researcher observed a small group of preschool boys and noticed how, over two years, they adapted to cultural cues. The ways they dressed, played and related to one another and to their parents changed significantly. They even formed a “Mean Team” to harass girls in their classroom. Another researcher interviewed elementary-school boys and captured their brutally frank stories of punishing other boys who failed to conform.
Boys take their experiences to heart, feeling weak and ashamed when they need comfort. Plan International USA, a nonprofit group focused on children’s rights, commissioned a study among 10- to 19-year-olds that found nearly three-quarters of boys said they felt pressure to be physically strong and nearly half of the 14- to 19 year-old male respondents felt pressure to be “willing to punch someone if provoked.”
The link between masculine norms and misconduct has been clearly established. A 2017 study of 18- to 30-year-old men from the United States, Britain and Mexico found that the young men who subscribe most to traditional gender identities were unhappier and more prone to bullying and sexual harassment. Nearly 60 percent of the American respondents said their parents were the primary source of these restrictive cues.
Boys don’t come into the world with some inborn tendency toward domination or violence. As the Stanford psychologist Albert Bandura explained: “People are not born with preformed repertoires of aggressive behavior. They must learn them.” The problem is rooted in boys’ socialization, which is characterized by physical discipline, control and disdain for weakness.
With this template for relating to themselves and to the world, it is not surprising that, compared with girls, adolescent boys and young men abuse tobacco at higher rates, drive more recklessly and engage in riskier sex. In the United States, 75 percent of deaths among 15- to 24-year-olds are of boys and young men. Males are more likely than females to die from injuries sustained in car accidents or falls, and from homicides. Especially when the risks of masculinity are compounded by racism and poverty, too many boys do not survive into manhood.
Students, read the entire article, then tell us:
— What’s the hardest thing about being a boy? What specific pressures or challenges do boys face? If you’re a girl, what do you observe to be hardships for boys?
— What are the good or best things about being male? What are the advantages that society provides for boys and men?
— Where did you learn what it is to be man or woman? From parents, peers, pop culture? Tell us about a specific time you learned what is expected of you based on your gender? For example, how boys or girls are supposed to dress or act, laugh or cry, express themselves or not?
— Mr. Reichert provides many facts and statistics about boys’ attitudes, behavior and life outcomes. Which did you find most significant and striking, and why? Do you agree with his view that “boyhood immerses boys in violence and the bullying that leads to it?” What have you experienced or observed that supports or contradicts this belief? If you are a boy, have you ever felt pressure to act tough and fight to not appear weak?
— What do adults, parents and teachers get wrong about being a boy? Do you ever feel confused or frustrated by the messages you receive about what it is to be a boy or man? Do you think it is harder to be a boy or man today than for your parents or grandparents? Why or why not?
— The Opinion piece ends:
Fathers, especially, may feel that times have changed so much since they were boys that their counsel amounts to outdated clichés. And it’s true that this generation of boys is in a much better position than we are to assess the future. But it’s not true that we are not needed — far from it.
What parents can do, must do, for their sons is never underestimate the power of listening to them, knowing them, and standing by while they navigate the rough waters of boyhood. Behind every boy who avoids being swept away in the current is someone who holds him — and believes in his ability to hold his own.
Do you agree with Mr. Reichert’s advice to parents? What role should parents play in helping boys to navigate the challenges of boyhood? What would you recommend to parents seeking to understand how to better to support their sons?
After 2 years of big news for the higher education sector, this year’s federal budget hasn’t proposed major changes to education. Little news is good news, as they (sort of) say. In this case, the proposed changes are actually good news, with far more presence of the word ‘funding’, than the word ‘cuts’.
Keep in mind that the proposed changes are likely to change again, with the election predicted to take place in May. Nevertheless, it’s good to get an idea of where the priorities lie – at least for now.
Recap on last year’s budget
Last year, a few major changes were proposed. Highlights were:
Freeze on funding increases for universities, shifting from demand-driven funding to capped funding until 2020.
Lowered loan repayment threshold, requiring student debts to be repaid when salary reaches $45,000.
Less Commonwealth Supported Places available, particularly for those studying a postgraduate degree
Replacing the lifetime borrowing limit on FEE-HELP loans with a general limit, to allow repeated borrowing up to $100,000
More funding for rural students
This year’s highlights for Higher Ed
Advantages for HELP debt holders
Teachers who commit to a teaching role in a remote school for a minimum of 4 years will have their debt remitted.
Students studying aviation at VET level can access to a higher loan limit of $150,000
The application fee and annual charge for holding a HELP debt will be delayed by 12 months
Bringing the USI to higher ed
The Unique Student Identifier (USI) was previously used for VET-level education, but will now extend to higher education. Currently, uni students receive an ID number specific to their university, but the USI will track a person’s studies at any institution Australia wide. The data captured by the USI will help track trends on a wider scale, and help inform future policies.
Destination Australia Scholarship
In an effort to encourage more students to regional and rural areas of Australia, the Government plans to establish ‘Destination Australia’, which will offer over 1000 scholarships to both Australian and international students, at $15,000 per year.
Whichever way the election takes our country, we’re confident that higher education will still be of utmost importance, and the accessibility to higher education, still a major priority. If you’d like more details on this year’s budget, visit the Department of Education and Training website.
As always, our door is always open to you, no matter your academic history. Don’t hesitate to get in touch with a friendly student advisor if you’d like chat about your vision for the future.
Codecademy’s very own Nick Duckwiler (left) and Ryan Tuck from Warby Parker (right) in our office. (📷: Mitch Boyer)
Last month, Codecademy and Warby Parker came together to work on a special Learn SQL from Scratch Capstone Project. It was during this time when I met Ryan Tuck, a Data Engineer at Warby, who played a major part in this partnership. So when he decided to drop by our office for the final QA round, I had to break out my notebook and ask some questions. Enjoy.
Hey Ryan, let’s start off with a question I’ve had for a while — what is a Data Engineer? (Is it similar to a Data Analyst or a Software Engineer?)
At Warby Parker, data engineers are responsible for creating and maintaining the plumbing required to support the data and reporting needs of the business. We use software engineering practices to automate the work of data cleaning, normalizing, and model building so that data is always ready to be consumed by data analysts in every department.
What languages/frameworks do you use at Warby?
On data engineering, we use Python as our general purpose programming language, as do most of the other teams in our Technology department. When it comes to databases, we use PostgreSQL for the majority of our SQL needs, and are beginning to use Amazon Athena and Google BigQuery for some of our larger datasets. We use Looker as our exclusive business intelligence entry point to all of this data.
What are some of the projects you worked on?
I’ve had the privilege of working with a lot of of smart people in every department at our company to help them solve their varied data needs, from reconciling financial data with the Accounting team to automating and modeling standardized performance metrics for our team of over 200 customer experience advisors.
As part of a team of five supporting the data needs of a rapidly growing company, I’ve tried where possible to focus on helping our analysts solve their own problems. This includes helping people learn Python and commit to our codebase, guiding the creation of data models in SQL, and encouraging people to submit pull requests to add features in Looker, our BI tool.
Seeing dozens of otherwise “non-technical” colleagues opening up PRs on a daily basis, and consequently being part of the democratization of tech that we value at Warby Parker, is probably the most rewarding “project” I’ve been a part of.
One project finished recently during our first annual “Hackweek” is called Pipes, which allows anyone at the company to easily move large amounts of data from wherever to wherever (Looker, Google Sheets, PostgreSQL, BigQuery, etc) on a regular cadence, or manually through a simple one-line chatbot interface. The adoption has been overwhelmingly positive and we’re looking to grow this sort of tooling out even more.
“We use software engineering practices to automate the work of data cleaning, normalizing, and model building so that data is always ready to be consumed by data analysts in every department.”
What got you into the data field?
I’ve always been drawn to analytical fields like math, and became pretty proficient in Excel during some internships in college. Once I had learned to program and learned more about data science and its applications in artificial intelligence, I knew that anything I could do to immerse myself in the world of data would be a step in the right direction.
Three and a half years ago, I landed a job as a junior software engineer at Warby Parker not fully knowing what I was in for, but am so glad I got the opportunity to help build tools to support an interesting and ever-changing data-driven culture here.
Where did you learn SQL and Python?
I had a background in C++, and was exposed to Python through an Intro to Data Science course. When Warby Parker hired me onto the Data team in 2015, I had never written a SQL query in my life, but picked it up quickly and within a few months started up internal SQL training classes, which I still teach on a monthly basis.
What does your tattoo say?
The ultimate cheatsheet.
This is Bayes’ Theorem, which is an equation that describes how to update probabilities given new evidence. Two summers ago I worked on building a tool to help predict weekly fantasy football performance. Some colleagues suggested a Bayesian approach would be appropriate, since there aren’t really enough data points in an NFL season to be able to use statistical approaches that require larger datasets, and I’d want to regularly update my predictions after each player’s latest performance.
I did a deep dive into understanding the (simple) math underlying Bayes’ Theorem and came out of that experience with a whole new worldview, understanding my entire knowledge of the world as a big and intricate probabilistic model that I was continuously updating with every experience I ever have. It was pretty transformative, and I figured that was worth a tattoo.
What is a concept in SQL/Python that’s essential to your work?
Donald Knuth said, “Premature optimization is the root of all evil.” I’ve generally found this to be true, and try to live by it in my work. For example, I’ll generally prefer to keep a data model simple by rebuilding it for all time on a daily basis using a single SQL query instead of making a more complicated model that requires iteratively adding to a table, keeping track of state, updated timestamps, when something last ran, etc.
A wise man once said, “Duplicating data makes things go fast,” but databases are already impressively fast to begin with, without implementing anything to improve performance. Ultimately, I almost always approach a problem thinking about optimizing for my time over machine time, for readability over performance, and for introducing as little cognitive overhead as is required by the problem at hand. Only once performance issues or readability issues present themselves will some code be worth a rewrite.
Last question! Since you wrote Warby Parker’s internal SQL training courses, I know there gotta be some inner Curriculum Developer in you. Can you teach a SQL concept in 2 minutes?
Sure! Have you ever written a query that yields some result set and you think, “I’d love to query the stuff I just produced like it was a table?” Enter the WITH clause.
Suppose I have a mega query that gives the transaction summaries:
select
transactions.date as transaction_date,
sum(items.price) as total_cost,
count(*) as number_of_items
from
transactions
inner join
customers
on
customers.id = transactions.customer_id
inner join
transaction_items
on
transactions.id = transaction_items.transaction_id
inner join
items
on
items.id = transaction_items.item_id
Using WITH, I can create a temporary table within my query that I can SELECT from and treat it just like a regular old table.
I will put everything from the previous query in a parentheses and use WITH to give it the name transaction_summaries.
Then I’ll apply the date and customer filtering down below for a more readable query, to separate out all the JOIN logic from the actual WHERE filters that I want to apply on that data.
with transaction_summaries as (
select
transactions.date as transaction_date,
sum(items.price) as total_cost,
count(*) as number_of_items
from
transactions
inner join
customers
on
customers.id = transactions.customer_id
inner join
transaction_items
on
transactions.id = transaction_items.transaction_id
inner join
items
on
items.id = transaction_items.item_id
)
select
*
from
transaction_summaries
where
first_name = 'beyonce'
and
transaction_date > '2018–01–01'
order by
total_cost desc
limit
5
If you’re familiar with subqueries, this does a similar thing but makes the SQL far more readable, even if your query isn’t quite as performant as it would have been. This is essentially an implementation of the mantra “Don’t Repeat Yourself” that’s common in the world of programming.
Incredible. And love the SQL styling! 😍
Huge shout out to Ryan and the whole Warby Parker team for making this partnership happen. Special hat tips for behind-the-scenes support from:
Greensboro has a 28-6 record — the best in program history — and finished second in the Southern Conference, behind Wofford, which was ranked 20th in this week’s Associated Press poll.
Did luck have something to do with it?
Miller, pulling up a folding chair before a recent practice, reacted as one might expect. He praised Pomeroy as “a genius,” expressed fascination with analytics and said there were others on his staff who delve deeper into the data to provide the most salient information about the Spartans and their opponents.
Then he assumed a defensive stance.
“I’m not a mathematician,” he said. “I’m a basketball coach who’s always trying to figure out an edge to help me coach better. But there’s never been anybody that could put a number on will and togetherness of group.
Above is an image related to one of the news stories we followed this past week. Do you know what it shows? At the bottom of this quiz, you’ll find the answer.
Have you been paying attention to the news recently? See how many of these 10 questions you can get right.
Imagine you could live your life without experiencing pain. Not quite as a superhero, you wouldn’t be super strong — you just wouldn’t feel any pain, physical or emotional. Ever.
She’d been told that childbirth was going to be painful. But as the hours wore on, nothing bothered her — even without an epidural.
“I could feel that my body was changing, but it didn’t hurt me,” recalled the woman, Jo Cameron, who is now 71. She likened it to “a tickle.” Later, she would tell prospective mothers, “Don’t worry, it’s not as bad as people say it is.”
It was only recently — more than four decades later — that she learned her friends were not exaggerating.
Rather, there was something different about the way her body experienced pain: For the most part, it didn’t.
Scientists believe they now understand why. In a paper published Thursday in The British Journal of Anaesthesia, researchers attributed Ms. Cameron’s virtually pain-free life to a mutation in a previously unidentified gene. The hope, they say, is that the finding could eventually contribute to the development of a novel pain treatment. They believe this mutation may also be connected to why Ms. Cameron has felt little anxiety or fear throughout her life and why her body heals quickly.
The author discusses how Ms. Cameron was discovered by scientists:
The sequence of events that led scientists to investigate Ms. Cameron’s genes began about five years ago. She was living a happy, ordinary life on the banks of Loch Ness in Scotland with her husband, she said. After a hand operation, a doctor seemed perplexed that she was not experiencing any pain and did not want painkillers.
“I guarantee I won’t need anything,” Ms. Cameron recalled telling Dr. Devjit Srivastava, a consultant in anesthesia and pain medicine at a National Health Service hospital in northern Scotland and one of the authors of the paper.
A few follow-up questions revealed that Ms. Cameron was unusual. At 65, she’d needed to have her hip replaced. Because it had not caused her pain, she had not noticed anything was amiss until it was severely degenerated. Cuts, burns, fractures — these did not hurt either. In fact, it often took the smell of burning flesh or her husband identifying blood for her to notice something wrong. She also reported that eating Scotch bonnet chili peppers left only a “pleasant glow.”
The article continues:
Scientists are also intrigued by Ms. Cameron’s extraordinarily low anxiety level. On an anxiety disorder questionnaire, she scored zero out of 21. She cannot recall ever having felt depressed or scared.
“I am very happy,” she said.
In retrospect, she sees how her genetic disposition may have aided her at work. After years as a primary-school teacher, she retrained to work with people with severe mental disabilities. Erratic, aggressive behavior never riled her, she said.
But though having this mutation may sound like a dream, there are downsides. One is that she is quite forgetful; prone to losing her keys and her train of thought midsentence. The other is that she’s never felt the “adrenaline rush” that other people talk about, she said.
Students, read the entire article, then tell us:
— Would you want to live a life without ever feeling pain — physical and psychological? What would be the advantages and disadvantages of a life without pain?
— How do you imagine your life would be different? In what ways might you be happier? What growth or development, stemming from anxiety or pain, might you have missed? Would you choose to live a pain-free life if it meant that you would never experience an adrenaline rush, as Ms. Cameron says she never has?
— What role has physical pain played in your life? Do you think you have a high or low threshold for pain? Tell us about a memorable experience with physical pain. Were you able to take something positive from the experience?
Wise men in every tradition tell us that suffering brings clarity, illumination; for the Buddha, suffering is the first rule of life, and insofar as some of it arises from our own wrongheadedness — our cherishing of self — we have the cure for it within. Thus in certain cases, suffering may be an effect, as well as a cause, of taking ourselves too seriously. I once met a Zen-trained painter in Japan, in his 90s, who told me that suffering is a privilege, it moves us toward thinking about essential things and shakes us out of shortsighted complacency; when he was a boy, he said, it was believed you should pay for suffering, it proves such a hidden blessing.
Do you agree? What life lessons can pain and suffering teach?
— By some estimates, tens of millions of Americans suffer from chronic pain. The global pain management drug industry is valued at over $58 billion. Should scientists and pharmaceutical companies investigate Ms. Cameron’s case in hopes of developing more effective treatments for pain? If scientists were successful in developing a pain intervention or vaccine, would you seek out this product? Would you choose to shield your children from physical or emotional pain?
Students 13 and older are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.
3. Before Microsoft’s new controller, how did the gamer community — especially gamers with disabilities — adapt video game technology to meet the needs of diverse users?
4. How has the Adaptive Controller affected the lives of gamers with disabilities like Ms. Hawley?
5. Why will the new controller’s versatility also be attractive to the broader community of gamers, including professional gamers, according to Bryce Johnson, Microsoft’s inclusive lead for product research and accessibility?
6. The article concludes with a quotation from Mark Barlet, a disabled Air Force veteran and founder of AbleGamers:
If you’re on the streets, everyone knows you’re a profoundly disabled individual. You can’t hide this fact. But in a video game, you’re a player. We all jump into video games for some level of fantasy.
Do you agree with Mr. Barlet? Are video games a way to escape the limitations of everyday life and jump into fantasy? What draws you to video games?
Finally, tell us more about what you think:
— What did you learn from the article? What was most interesting or surprising to you? In what ways do video games in general, and controllers in particular, meet or not meet your needs? Do you think you would want to use the Xbox Adaptive Controller?
— What role do video games have in your life? Do you consider yourself a gamer? Or are you just an occasional player? In what ways has gaming opened up new worlds for you? What life lessons has gaming taught you?
— How would you redesign your favorite game, console or controller to be more accessible to gamers with a range of different needs?
— In 2010, Congress passed the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, which requires companies to make computers, smartphones, gaming consoles and other technology accessible to people with disabilities. What industries, companies and products would you like to see create or redesign products to better meet the diverse needs of its users?
