Wednesday Required Reading and Viewing

1. Colleges Have Shed a Tenth of Their Employees Since the Pandemic Began. The Great Contraction gathers steam. Yesterday, my uni announced the formation of a Joint Faculty Committee which will decide which programs and faculty to cut. When we did this four years ago, I knew we didn’t cut deeply enough. I regret being right.

2. Italian Police Use Lamborghini To Transport Donor Kidney 300 Miles In Two Hours. Should help with recruiting.

3. Have rogue orcas really been attacking boats in the Atlantic? This story has it all including a “rogue pod” and marauding “teenagers”. 

4. Jason Reynolds: Honesty, Joy, and Anti-Racism. Great book, highly recommended.

5. The Secret to Deep Cleaning. Come on over if you’d like to practice.

Tuesday’s Required Reading

1. What Anti-racist Teachers Do Differently.

“I have witnessed countless black students thrive in classrooms where teachers see them accurately and show that they are happy to have them there. In these classes, students choose to sit in the front of the class, take careful notes, shoot their hands up in discussions, and ask unexpected questions that cause the teacher and other classmates to stop and think. Given the chance, they email, text, and call the teachers who believe in them.”

2. The Tesla of masks. How ’bout it Captain?

3. Take this new and improved personality quiz. Isn’t there still a built-in complication–our inherently subjective sense of self?

4. Democratic ad makers think they’ve discovered Trump’s soft spot.

. . . unlike four years ago, they are no longer focusing on his character in isolation — rather they are pouring tens of millions of dollars into ads yoking his behavior to substantive policy issues surrounding the coronavirus, the economy and the civil unrest since the death of George Floyd.”

5. France bans Dutch bike TV ad for ‘creating climate of fear’ about cars’.

6. Corina Newsome: A birder who happens to be Black.

How To Raise An Anti-Racist Kid

By Tara Parker-Pope. Chock-full of good ideas. Among them:

“Supplement your child’s education with books and documentaries, and don’t shy away from conversations about race.”

Every Martin Luther King day The Good Wife read a book about King’s life to our daughters. One on each side of her, sitting on the couch. Even though it was written on a third/fourth grade level, the readings continued into secondary school. That very small investment of time had an oversized impact on them becoming socially conscious young women.

Reflecting On The Color Of My Skin

By Marques Brownlee, my favorite tech reviewer.

“I want to try to be something to look up to for kids like the 15 year old me.  The kids who want to be able to look at a high level of something and see someone that looks like them, making the right choices, and finding success.”

Success as in 11.2 million subscribers to his channel. And in thoughtful and profound consciousness raising.