News2008Apr

=CCT News=

31 Mar 08
See also previous news, alum news and exchanges, items for the upcoming news, and [|CCT calendar]. Inform cct@umb.edu if you have news OR want to be emailed when there's a new news compilation (no more than once/month) OR want to be removed from such mailings.

Contents: Student matters, CCT community, CCT events, alums, other events, opportunities, resources, food for thought, humor

**Student Matters** Please submit updated course plans to CCT office. Fall registration starts April 7, 2008. Make sure to register before June 1 to avoid late fees.

**CCT Community** The Delores Gallo fund (established on the occasion of her retirement) invites proposals for funding small projects of CCT students and alums, e.g., to bring in guests to your classes, initiate a new creative project, prepare your writing/photography/etc. for publication, buy materials for your classroom,... Deadline, April 1. http://www.cct.umb.edu/gallofund.html

Our Lives and Other Worlds: Writing, Stories, and Reflections from Graduates of the CCT Program The presentations last week were wonderful. Alas, we had some technical difficulties with the audio recording and the buzz makes some of the audio hard to listen to. Anyway, here it is: http://cct.wikispaces.com/CCTNetwork26Feb08 (If we can make time, we'll transcribe the audio.) Thanks to the speakers for their willingness to make the idea a reality -- a great gift to the rest of us. The CCT Network organizing group is looking forward to future events in future semesters on Visual Arts, Music and Performing Arts, Classroom and School Change, Adult Education, Business Innovation, Personal and Career Change, Health Care.... Volunteers welcome.

**CCT Events** Monday, March 31, 6:45-8:30pm, THE BOSTON UNIVERSITY BIO-LAB CONTROVERSY An invigorating discussion with one of last semester's problem-based learning (PBL) teams, Wheatley 4th floor lounge. RSVP

April 16, 4.15-6.45, Harvard Project Zero leading research associate & CCT alum, Dr. Shari Tishman, “Artful Thinking: Using the Power of Art to Teach Thinking Across Curriculum” Campus center Ballroom A.

**Alum Notes** From Jan Coe: Work at the Telethon Institute of Child Health Research is really interesting. I'm still being trained in the data collection and was kind of disappointed to find out that the actual analysis of the study families data is done at Kansas University, one of the study partners for Looking at Language. I went to the Population Sciences scientific meeting on Tuesday, which is an all day affair where different researchers are allowed 10 minutes each to give presentations of their current work - VERY interesting. I wish I had had Gordis in hand to refresh my memory of the standard terms like odds ratio, outcome measure, confidence interval, etc.

From Meghann McNiff: Check out these photos of Kyle’s visit to see Meghann in Afghanistan. Meghann expects to come back home in August: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mclindholmadventures/

See also new wiki page for alums to share news, questions, advice...

**Events**

March 31, 2008: Forum and discussion panel: "**What happened to Diversity?**"; Wheatley 6-047 from 2:30-4:00pm. Open to all.

April 3, 2008: UMass-Boston is hosting a screening of the The documentary film, “**Two Million Minutes**”. See http://www.2mminutes.com/ for more details.

April 4-5, 2008: Conference, “**Who’s Laughing? The Politics of Humor**”at MIT’s Stata Center, free and open to the public. See http://web.mit.edu/gcws/Grad_Conference_08/register08.html for details and registration.

April 5, 2008: **Sudbury Valley School Fortieth Anniversary Celebration** with alumni presentations, Sudbury Valley School, Framingham, www.sudval.org

Cross the threshold of **Best Practices in Gifted Education** in partnership with Massachusetts Association for Gifted Education Presents "Best Practices in Gifted Education: The Partnership Among Home, Classroom and School" April 12, 2008 Marlborough, MA. http://www.nagc.org/NAGC2/Users/Seminars


 * Women's health activist conference**: Raise Your Voice for the Health Care We Need! April 17 and 18, 2008. Hosted by Simmons College, Boston, Massachusetts [|http://www.RaisingWomensVoices.net]

April 18-20, 2008: The **Inaugural Millennium Campus Conference**, Hosted by **MIT's Global Poverty Initiative**. This conference includes several workshops and discussion sessions around the challenge of global poverty with respect to many different fields. Get more information and register at http://gpi.mit.edu/

April 28, 2008: Spring 2008 Semester Speakers Gerontology Colloquium Series, "**High-Quality Nursing Home Care Begins With A Vision**", UMass-Boston in Wheatley-3-125, 1:00-2:15pm

May 2-4, 2008: **Jobs with Justice National Conference**, Providence, RI, [|http://www.jwj.org]

May 12, 2008: Spring 2008 Semester Speakers Gerontology Colloquium Series, "**Highlights of Research at the Gerontology Institute**", UMass-Boston in Wheatley-3-125, 1:00-2:15pm

July 13-18, 2008: **Approaching Walden: A Professional Development Seminar for High School Educators**, Thoreau Institute-Lincoln, MA, [|http://www.walden.org]

**Opportunities**

Professional Development Grants for graduate students: Apply for a **Professional Development Grant** (PDG) from the Graduate Student Assembly! The PDG represents the largest program expenditure of the GSA. The GSA allocates funds to reimburse matriculated graduate students who attend or present their research at conferences and professional meetings related to their field of study. A student presenting a paper or poster can be rewarded up to $500 to aid trip expenses. A student not presenting a paper or poster can be rewarded up to $400 to aid trip expenses. Program details, reward breakdown, and program guidelines and application requirements can be downloaded at http://www.gsa.umb.edu/programs.htm.

Call for proposals: **Northeastern Educational Research Association (NERA)** seeks proposals from graduate students to present your research or submit your paper for the NERA's annual conference in October of 2008. Deadline for proposal is June 15, 2008. See http://www.nera-education.org/ for more information.

**Resources** National Center for Teaching Thinking: http://www.nctt.net/lessonsarticles.html

[|http://www.thepraxisproject.org] Praxis prak’ sis 1. exercise or practice of an art, science or skill. 2. The practical application of theory; action informed by theory. 3. The synergy between theory and action; the highest form of practice. The Praxis Project 1. An innovative not for profit institution dedicated to capacity building, technical assistance, research, and training for community-based policy change.

**Humor**

**Food for Thought** Recent article about a professor at MIT with a very "CCT" approach: http://potw.news.yahoo.com/s/potw/63302/high-wire-act