4. What kinds of relief and aid efforts are underway? How has the flooding affected these efforts?
5. Why have relief efforts focused on the city of Beira in Mozambique? How did the cyclone affect this port city in particular?
6. Nick Mangwana, a spokesman for the Zimbabwean government, said on Twitter:
This cyclone has come at a very huge human cost. We certainly need a regional approach to these effects of global warming. These problems are transnational.
Do you agree? What connection is there between global warming and tropical storms like Cyclone Idai? How should the nations of the world respond to the disaster in Southern Africa?
Finally, tell us more about what you think:
Another natural disaster, half a world apart from southern Africa, is unfolding in the United States, where record flooding has ravaged Nebraska and other Midwestern states. Officials in Nebraska, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Iowa have declared emergencies or disasters as floodwaters have forced hundreds of people from their homes. In “Like ‘House Arrest’: Flooded Roads and Swamped Bridges Strand Nebraskans,” Mitch Smith writes:
Record floodwaters have ravaged Nebraska, but as they begin to recede, an alarming reality has come into view: Hundreds of miles of highway remain impassable, bridges have been wiped out and routine drives have become treacherous ordeals. In a vast, largely rural state where people rely on two-lane highways and aging bridges to go about daily life, the devastation of basic infrastructure promised to be an expensive and long-term challenge.
“I don’t know how they’re going to get everything fixed that needs to be fixed,” said Ms. Snowdon, who said she had canceled a teaching assignment in a nearby town because it would have required 143 miles of driving. “It’s like a dream and you’re going to wake up and it’s going to be all O.K. But it’s not. This could be a year of traveling.”
For nearly a week, Nebraska and other Midwestern states have been inundated with water as rivers were overwhelmed with rain and melting snow that the frozen ground was unable to absorb. After days of harrowing helicopter rescues, frantic sandbagging and urgent evacuation orders, water levels had dropped in much of Nebraska by Tuesday and the daunting cleanup process was in full swing.
“We deal with flooding all the time,” said Kyle Schneweis, the director of the Nebraska Department of Transportation, but “when you talk about 1,500 miles of our system underwater, that’s an entirely different scope and scale.”
Look at this map and answer the following questions: In what ways are the floods in the American Midwest and southern Africa similar? How are they different? What role does geography play in each of these two natural disasters?
When you read or hear news of large-scale suffering and devastation like this, how do you react? Why? Why do you think some disasters get more coverage — and more attention and help from individuals — than others? Do you ever feel a sense of “disaster fatigue”? What do you think ordinary citizens can do to help the victims of these two natural disasters?
This week, Mike Trout, the center fielder for the Los Angeles Angels, is finalizing a contract extension that will be worth about $430 million over the next 10 years — the richest contract in the history of North American sports.
What is your reaction to this record-breaking deal? Do you think any athlete is worth that amount of money? If so, who do you think deserves to get paid hundreds of millions of dollars to play? If not, why not?
Tell us in the comments, then read the related article to learn more about Trout’s $430 million deal.
Find many more ways to use our Picture Prompt feature in this lesson plan.
A bowler hat, its neat grosgrain bow intact. A chubby bronze cherub, one foot torn away. A cracked and crusty leather valise.
These are among 5,500 items recovered from the wreckage of the Titanic, hauled up from two miles below the surface in international waters off Newfoundland.
Investors with three hedge funds have banded together to pay $19.5 million to buy the collection, outbidding a group of British museums backed by the National Geographic Society and James Cameron, who directed the 1997 movie “Titanic.”
Last week, California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a moratorium on capital punishment in his state. Watch the one-minute video above announcing his decision.
Should the United States as a country stop using the death penalty? Is it ever justified, such as for the most heinous crimes? Or do you think it is always cruel and unusual punishment? Alternatively, do you think it should be suspended for practical reasons, such as because it is costly or sometimes unfairly administered?
LOS ANGELES — Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a moratorium on capital punishment on Wednesday, granting a temporary reprieve for the 737 inmates on the state’s death row, the largest in the Western Hemisphere.
The move is highly symbolic because legal challenges have already stalled executions in California; the last one was in 2006. But death penalty opponents hope that because of California’s size and political importance, the governor’s action will give new urgency to efforts to end executions in other states as popular support for the death penalty wanes.
Mr. Newsom, a longtime opponent of capital punishment, cited its high cost, racial disparities in its application and wrongful convictions, and questioned whether society has the right to take a life.
“I know people think eye for eye, but if you rape, we don’t rape,” he said. “And I think if someone kills, we don’t kill. We’re better than that.”
He continued, “I cannot sign off on executing hundreds and hundreds of human beings, knowing — knowing — that among them will be innocent human beings.”
Supporters of capital punishment said the move went against the will of the state’s residents. California voters have rejected an initiative to abolish the death penalty and in 2016, they narrowly approved Proposition 66 to help speed it up.
“I think this would be a bold step and I think he’s got to be aware of the political downside,” said Michael D. Rushford, president of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, an organization in Sacramento that favors the death penalty and helped draft the ballot proposition, speaking before the governor’s announcement. “Voters have had multiple opportunities in California over three decades to abandon the death penalty and they’ve shut them down at every chance.”
The article continues:
After the news of Mr. Newsom’s decision broke, Mr. Trump said on Twitter: “Defying voters, the Governor of California will halt all death penalty executions of 737 stone cold killers. Friends and families of the always forgotten VICTIMS are not thrilled, and neither am I!”
Speaking several hours later, Mr. Newsom said he had met with families of victims and they had expressed passionate but conflicting views on capital punishment. But the governor made it clear that his decision came down to his own conscience, prodded by impending decisions such as whether to support the state’s lethal injection protocol.
An executive order Mr. Newsom signed on Wednesday does three things: grants reprieves to the inmates currently on death row — they will still be under a death sentence, but not at risk of execution; closes the execution chamber at San Quentin prison; and withdraws the state’s lethal injection protocol, the formally approved procedure for carrying out executions.
“Three out of four nations in the world know better and are doing better,” Mr. Newsom said. “They’ve abolished the death penalty. It’s time California join those ranks.”
The article concludes:
Opponents of the death penalty, including Mr. Newsom, have long argued that the practice is rife with racial disparities and is not justified by the high cost to state taxpayers. One study, in 2011, found that California pays $184 million a year to sustain capital punishment — or close to an accumulated $5 billion since the practice was reinstituted in 1978.
In February, Mr. Newsom intervened in a high-profile death row case that for years activists have claimed was a prime example of racial injustice.
Kevin Cooper, a black man who was convicted of four brutal murders by stabbing in 1983, has long maintained his innocence. His supporters have put forward evidence that he was framed by San Bernardino officers. Mr. Newsom ordered DNA testing in the case, something that state officials had refused to do in the past.
The possibility of wrongful convictions — nationally, more than 150 people on death row have been exonerated since the mid-1970s, according to the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty — has also energized the opposition movement, around the country and in California.
Last April in California, a man who had been on death row for 25 years for murdering a young girl, a former farmworker named Vicente Figueroa Benavides, was freed after a court determined that testimony given at his trial was false.
Students, read the entire article, then tell us:
— Do you support or oppose the use of the capital punishment? Should it be abolished in the United States?
— Do you think the death penalty serves a necessary purpose, like deterring crime, providing relief for victims’ families or imparting justice? Or is capital punishment “cruel and unusual punishment” and therefore prohibited by the Constitution?
— What is your reaction to Gov. Newsom’s moratorium announcement? Which of his arguments for a moratorium do you find most persuasive? Which are the least?
— The article states:
But in 2016, Californians doubled down on the death penalty, approving a measure that streamlined the appeals process, which has typically taken about 25 years in California for condemned prisoners. The initiative, which was backed by many law enforcement officials and prosecutors, passed with 51 percent of the vote, belying California’s national image as place where politics was steadily moving to the left. It was approved at the same time that voters legalized marijuana.
Do you think Mr. Newsom was right to issue a moratorium despite recent votes in support of the death penalty by California’s residents? Do you think it violates the will of the state’s residents, or should he follow his own conscience? Should public opinion matter in cases like capital punishment?
— How concerned should we be about wrongful convictions? Do you have concerns about the fair application of the death penalty, or about the possibility of the criminal justice system executing an innocent person? Do the recent cases of Kevin Cooper and Vicente Figueroa Benavides, cited in the article, affect your views?
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:
For all the gains that women have made in golf — the increase in playing opportunities in college and the integration of formerly all-male private clubs — the disparity in purses between the women of the L.P.G.A. Tour and the men of the PGA Tour continues to be striking.
… Brittany Lincicome, a two-time major champion, said that when she chooses to practice at T.P.C. Tampa Bay near her home she is required to pay cart fees. Card-carrying members of the PGA Tour incur no such fees.
What bothers Lincicome is not the fee per se, “but the principle of it,” she said. “I’m a well-known L.P.G.A. player.”
Duke was given the No. 1 overall seed in the N.C.A.A. Division I men’s basketball tournament Sunday night, starting Coach Mike Krzyzewski and his star freshman Zion Williamson on a path to what they hope will be the Blue Devils’ sixth national title.
Duke (29-5) was one of three Atlantic Coast Conference teams to receive top seeds, joining Virginia (29-3) and North Carolina (27-6). It was the second time members of the same conference were named three of the four No. 1s; the Big East did so in 2009.
The fourth No. 1 seed was Gonzaga (30-3), the small stalwart from Spokane, Wash. While the Bulldogs lost the West Coast Conference title game to St. Mary’s last week, they already have a win over Duke on their résumé from a tournament in late November in Hawaii.
Of course, a top seed is no ticket to the Final Four in Minneapolis. Or even to the second round. Last year, for the first time in 136 such games, a No. 16 seed defeated a No. 1 when the University of Maryland-Baltimore County stunned Virginia.
We call them upsets. But unless you root for the team on the wrong end of one, they are the happiest things on Earth. They should be called overjoyeds.
There are two kinds of tournament underdogs. There is the team that makes an unlikely deep run — to the second weekend, the regional final, the Final Four — by artfully dodging the biggest threats, by emerging as a great squad in its own right. Then there is the team that knocks off a contender before normalcy reasserts itself. The first kind is a new planet, or an aged single-malt scotch; the second kind is a comet, or a tequila shot.
Here are some tequila shots. No predictions are made for this year’s Loyola-Chicago, the No. 11 seed that made last year’s Final Four through the blessings of Sister Jean, good shooting and the luck of facing a No. 9 seed in the regional final.
Rather, these six teams stand a better chance of winning their first games than you — and, more important, the other people in your pool — might think. Don’t sleep on the unlikeliest likeliest of all, at the bottom.
Here are two of Mr. Tracy’s upset picks:
No. 12 vs. No. 5
Murray State Will Beat Marquette
WHY IT WILL HAPPEN Basketball is a team sport, sure, but sometimes you just want to know which team has the best player on the court. And with all due respect to the Golden Eagles’ sensational Markus Howard, the answer is Murray State — thanks to high-flying guard Ja Morant, a sophomore who has played his way into N.B.A. lottery pick status.
No. 14 vs. No. 3
Yale Will Beat Louisiana State
WHY IT WILL HAPPEN It is refreshing that, this year, the jokes will not be about Ivy League elitism but Ivy League corruption: This is a positive development for the democratic sensibility. Unfortunately (or fortunately), the Ivy League remains one of the better midmajor conferences; it has gone 4-6 in opening N.C.A.A. tournament games over the last 10 seasons. This year’s Bulldogs were the league’s best team, per KenPom.com, and the team boasts an N.B.A. prospect in the junior Miye Oni.
Students, choose one of the articles and read it in its entirety, then tell us:
— How excited are you about March Madness? Will you watch or go to any of the games? Which teams are you rooting for?
— Will you fill out a bracket or join a pool this year? If so, what do you like about doing it, and why? Is the bracket competition more fun than the actual games? Why or why not?
— Which teams do you predict will be in the Final Four? Who will win? Will there be any major upsets this year? What matchups are you most looking forward to watching? Do you agree with any of Mr. Tracy’s picks?
— Will you be watching any of the games in the women’s Division I bracket, which was announced on Monday? Baylor (31-1), Mississippi State (30-2), Louisville (29-3) and Notre Dame (30-3) earned No. 1 seeds in this year’s field.
— If basketball isn’t your thing, what bracket-style competition can you imagine that you might enjoy more? For instance, maybe you’d like to participate in March Book Madness?
From March 5 to March 28, as it typically does three times a year, Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, appears to move backward across the sky — from east to west rather than from west to east.
Have you seen any negative effects in your life? Have you been more cautious about your actions? Or do you think fear or caution, based on astrological events, is nonsense?
1. What do astrologists warn us about while Mercury is in retrograde?
2. While Mercury may appear to be moving backward, what, scientifically, is taking place between Mercury and Earth’s orbit?
3. What evidence does the author present of astrology’s growing presence online? Which online communities represent the most significant growth?
4. Why are millennials increasingly drawn to online astrology?
5. How do some practitioners of astrology respond to skeptics and critics who call it “pseudoscience”? What do astrology defenders believe to be the positive benefits?
6. Chani Nicholas, an astrologer, says:
My main concern is that everyone has access to the therapies and practices that are healing to them. And if astrology is not that for you, then great, move on.
What do you think of her statement? Should people who don’t believe in astrology just move on? Do you think there is any value in pushing back against astrology? Do you think there is anything harmful about astrology?
Finally, tell us more about what you think:
— Do you believe in astrology? Or do you think it is harmless fiction? Or alternatively, do you think it’s actually harmful in any way — a dangerous pseudoscience or a hoax?
— Do you think the alignment of planets or stars has any influence on human life? Does the article make you more or less interested in what Amanda Hess calls the “mystical internet?” Will you change your behavior while Mercury is in retrograde?
— Do you regularly read your horoscope or discuss your astrological sign? If so, why? If not, what do you think of those who do? Have you ever visited an astrology or so-called mystical internet site? If yes, why? Does it provide you with a sense of spirituality? Community? Self-understanding?
— Why do you think astrology is on the rise? Is it a good thing? What evidence or personal experience do you have to support your opinion?
