Good read this morning from Sarah Blaine’s blog “parentingthecore”:1

“The Best For Me”

Here’s an excerpt:

We all make our way through school: sometimes we have teachers who inspire us, like Professor Bernstein. Sometimes we have terrific teachers we’re just not yet ready to learn from, like Mr. Winkler was for me. And sometimes we have teachers with whom we just don’t click. That’s an inherent part of the human experience. I know it was true when I taught: there were kids I know I reached, and there were kids I know I didn’t reach.

A good reminder that even the “best” can’t be perfect.

1. Incidentally, I first caught wind of her her blog in February, when her “You think you know what teachers do?” post went viral. By the way, the picture at the bottom of this post is worth a thousand bucks. [↩]

Via the Washington Post education blog:

7 charts: why you shouldn’t confuse correlation with causation

Because margarine consumption causes marriage break-ups in Maine.

Priceless.

Good read this morning, via Gallup, by way of NPR:

Poll: Prestigious Colleges Won’t Make You Happier In Life Or Work

The opening paragraph:

There’s plenty of anxiety in the U.S. over getting into a top college. But a new Gallup poll suggests that, later in life, it doesn’t matter nearly as much as we think. In fact, when you ask college graduates whether they’re “engaged” with their work or “thriving” in all aspects of their lives, their responses don’t vary one bit whether they went to a prestigious college or not.

The following blurb from the end of that read made me smile (emphasis mine):

In the meantime, the take-home message for students is clear, says Brandon Busteed, who leads Gallup’s education work: “If you can go to Podunk U debt free vs. Harvard for $100,000, go to Podunk.12 And concentrate on what you do when you get there.”

1. There’s an in-joke somewhere in there for my current and former AP Stat students [↩]
2. On the other hand, if you can go to Harvard for free……… [↩]

Greatness.

Grantland: Bill Barnwell Denver Broncos Week 4

Cue paragraph 4, where Barnwell starts talking about z-scores,1 means, and standard deviations. 2

By the way… what I wouldn’t give to attend the game this Sunday in Dallas.

1. If you’re currently in my class, you won’t learn about z-scores until Wednesday or Thursday… but if you’re currently in my class, what are you doing on my blog? Don’t you have more important things to do?? Such as your AP Stat homework? [↩]
2. Although… now that I think about it… I’m wondering if the scenario doesn’t warrant the use of standard errors and t-scores, as opposed to standard deviations and z-scores. Hmmm. [↩]