 Weekly News for Faculty, Staff and Friends of the Worcester State College Community |
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Second Entrepreneurship Program Announced
WSC to Host "Worcester Rising" Event for Scholarship Tea to Honor Leonard Morse, M.D. April is National Poetry Month WSC Students to Present Auction Proceeds to Local Charities Why Students Need to Know the Why? of Math
The history honor society, Phi Alpha Theta, held its annual Northern New England regional conference at the University of Massachusetts Lowell on April 12. Worcester State Colleges Michael Smith presented a resourceful paper, Is Islam the Source of Modern Terrorism? (Answer: Not so simple. There are many sources, including state and non-state terrorism.) Professor Joseph Baratta (History) commented in another panel on the Cold War, where students from Assumption and St. Anselm College presented papers on atomic testing in the Pacific, personalities of Stalin, Truman, Khrushchev and Kennedy, and Pope John Paul II in hastening the end of Communist party dictatorship in Poland. Allison Dunn (Physical Geography) co-authored a paper with P. Mahadevan, SC Wofsy, DM Matross, et al, that was recently published in the Journal of Global Biogeochemical Cycles. Margaret Kerr (Chemistry) served as an advisor at the Biomedical Science Careers Program on Saturday, April 5 in Boston. Ten Worcester State College students also attended the program. This program drew over 850 students and 250 advisors from 25 states. The Biomedical Science Careers Program was founded in 1991 by the Harvard Medical School Minority Faculty Development Program in collaboration with the Massachusetts Medical Society and the New England Board of Higher Education. The objective of the program is to increase the number of underrepresented minorities in the health professions and the biomedical sciences.
Amaryllis Siniossoglou (Visual and Performing Arts) has been accepted to
exhibit her art work at the 2008 Naestved Exhibition of Square Prints,
April is National Poetry Month
WSC Students to Present Auction Proceeds
The Worcester State College Student Government Association (SGA) will present proceeds from the 17th annual SGA auction to local charities, Thursday, April 24, at 4:30 p.m. in Student Center Blue Lounge exhibit area at Worcester State College. Representatives from the SGA will present $21, 422.57 among the Mustard Seed Foundation, which provides food and emergency services for the citys homeless; Abbys House, a local shelter for homeless women and Sherrys House, a place for Central New England families of children with cancer. The auction was made possible by a group of volunteer students, staff, and alumni of Worcester State College. All of the items for the auction are donated by area businesses and families. Auctions Chairs are Tracy Pilch - Student Government President Dana Lyford - Class of 2008 Senator and Rob Bilotta - Commuter Senator. Auction Committee Members are Liz Rooney - Class of 2010 Senator/Senate Treasurer Brandon Huggon - Student Trustee Lauren Kender - Resident Senator Lindsay Durell - Class of 2010 Senator. The Auction Advisor is Andrea Wamboldt. SGA is a student run government organization at Worcester State College that serves as a delegate for the entire population of undergraduate students. SGA serves as the primary advocate of students rights and is involved with forming the College policy.
Why Students Need to Know the Why?
of Math
Whats new is the urgent attention that mathematics education is getting at the national level. And a Worcester State College professor is helping focus that attention. Richard Bisk, chair of the Worcester State College mathematics department, spoke to the Council of Chief State School Officers in Washington on April 16. This is an organization of state commissioners of education. The speaking invitation from the Asia Society, which organized the meeting, cited Bisks expertise on the use of Singapore Math in the United States and noted your contributions would contribute much to our scheduled discussion. The education commissioners are very much interested in performance in math, Bisk said. They realize that as a country were in terrible shape. Bisk discovered what has become known as Singapore Math when he was asked to do a two-week summer course for teachers on this topic in 2000. I liked how crystal clear and succinct the approach was, Bisk said. The books really help students gain an understanding of deep mathematical ideas. Singapore emphasizes mastery of core mathematical concepts. Its students perform significantly better than U.S. students in international comparisons. Why Singapore? It isnt as if other Asian countries arent ahead of the United States in mathematics education. The textbooks used in Singapore are in English, which makes them easily adapted to U.S. classrooms. Japanese, or Korean, texts would be much more difficult to use here. About two months ago, the National Mathematics Advisory Panel, whose members President George W. Bush appointed, delivered its verdict on the state of mathematics education in the United States. Among its findings? The panel called for U.S. students to have a deeper understanding of basic math skills, including fluency with numbers and fractions. Furthermore, the panel noted, most U.S. math textbooks are too easy, especially at the elementary school level. Mathematics texts in Singapore are much better at presenting concepts and helping students to understand math, which is something Bisk noticed when he first used these texts. Bisk, a former co-chair of the Massachusetts Math and Science Advisory Council, practices what he preaches. In our professional development program, we use the Singapore Math texts to help teachers gain a deep understanding of math so that they can then teach for understanding, he said. We also use Singapore Math in our first course for Worcester State education majors, he added. And Mary Fowler is using it in the geometry class. Last summer Bisk organized a Singapore Math Summer Content Institute at Worcester State College. The 2008 Singapore Math Institute will run from June 23-27 for K-8 teachers from throughout Massachusetts. Those who want to earn graduate credit will sign up for an additional two and a half days, June 30, July 1-2. For further details about the Singapore Math Summer Content Institute, see http://wwwfac.worcester.edu/smip/
Films from the Middle East screened at Clark and WSC **Please Note - Links to online newspaper articles may no longer be available after a certain period of time.** |
Friday, April 18, 2008
THIS WEEK Friday, Apr. 18
Middle East Film
Saturday, Apr. 19
Women's Lacrosse
vs.
Middle East Film
Sunday, Apr. 20
Monday, Apr. 21 Tuesday, Apr. 22 Softball vs.
Becker College
Film:
Trade
Wednesday,
Apr. 23
Baseball
vs.
Talk:
Sarah Sharbach
Thursday, Apr. 24
Film/Reading: Talk:
Invited Artist Film:
The Great Warming, Women's
Lacrosse vs. Friday, Apr. 25
Talk:
Assessment with
COMING UP
Saturday, Apr. 26
Baseball
vs.
Softball
vs.
Sunday, Apr. 27
Consortium presents Tuesday, Apr. 29
A More
Perfect Union?
Talk:
Jack Levin and Thursday, May 1
VPA presents
Jephte Monday, May 5
Criminal Justice
Tuesday, May 6
Tuesday, May 7
Tuesday, May 8 May 9-16 Final Exams Tuesday, May 13
Talk:
How to
Write Student
Sunday, May 18 |
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By now, its old news
that U.S. students are behind their Asian counterparts when it comes to science
and math performance. 