Jwill's Log

Being confronted with a differential equations test this morning, I have come to a conclusion concerning partial credit. Partial credit should be a part of every test, of every procedure. I was confronted with one page of problems in which I was asked for short answers and some calculations to show from where my short answers came. It also stated that “partial credit will only be awarded in exceptional situations”. With only five minutes left to finish the test, I thought to myself, “What’s the point?” Why should I write something down if I’m not going to get any credit for it anyway? There is no incentive for me to write anything down, no incentive for me to even try the problem. I didn’t think I was going to get anything right on the head, so I thought it was useless to try something out.

Not giving partial credit, especially in math classes, is very demoralizing. One time last semester, I completed a problem using the wrong method and got the wrong answer. But the method was something that could be used for a situation similar to the one presented to me. Still, my professor gave me no credit. At all. All that work, that ten to fifteen minutes of my time. Wasted. I might as well have left it blank.

Sure, partial credit doesn’t always exist in life: if you build the bridge with the length of a part of it slightly off, it may fall down and lives may be lost. But I’m not building bridges right now. I’m answering questions about abstract mathematical concepts that won’t help me in life. Give me some credit for taking a stab at the problem, at least! I know that when I start teaching, I’ll give my students partial credit. Partial credit encourages students to try, to take a risk. With such credit, students will at least feel that if they write something like “I know this is this kind of problem and that this is the equation for it, but I’m a little confused about applying these numbers to it”, the teacher will respect their knowledge and give them some points.

How can one word have such a vastly different pair of meanings, even if one is informal and the other poetic?

Source: Boston.com
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This article by op-ed columnist Derrick Jackson discusses New York Governor Paterson’s failure to adopt a tax on soda and asks whether Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick will be able to put his into law. Paterson was destroyed by lobbyists and soda company executives on his tax proposal, which was more than triple Patrick’s.

I hope that this law goes into effect. Sure, I like not paying tax whenever I may buy a soda, but for the sake of the well-being of the Commonwealth, I’d pay a little extra. The beauty of the situation is that you only have to pay just a little more, anywhere from 5 to 10 cents extra. Multiply that by the thousands of people that buy soda, and you’ve got a solid source of revenue that will help in these tough times. Sure, people may not like to be taxed, but when all you have to do is pay an extra few cents to buy a soda, something you don’t need but want, why complain?

Source: Boston.com
Beth Israel Deaconess article, Lynn Teachers article, Patrick article, Kennedy article

In the age of recession and layoffs, people are worried whether they’ll keep the jobs and…you get it. You’ve heard this story already. It’s been on TV shows, you’ve heard it from your parents, your neighbors, your colleagues, your boss…everyone. I ran across three articles recently that show good and bad uses of money during the economic recession. Without further ado:

Good Example 1: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center President/CEO Paul Levy. A great article by Globe columnist Kevin Cullen who gets into the mind of Levy as Levy offers an alternate solution to booting workers. Instead of laying some off, how about we keep everyone on board for slightly less? Sure, there will be less money to go around, but less people have to deal with the cyclical unemployment process than usual. It’s brilliant; it’s human sacrifice and teamwork.

Good Example 2: Teachers in Lynn last week went a day without pay to prevent layoffs. Not only did the teachers agree to volunteer for a day, but also, administrators and other employees also agreed. This greatly cut their deficit and allowed them to cancel over one hundred layoffs. Imagine if every school did such a thing to cut some of their deficit instead of destroying entire departments or cutting teachers, thereby lowering the quality of the entire school? You have to think about the kids when making budget cuts.

Bad Example 1: Deval Patrick decides to give State Senator Marian Walsh a job at a state bonding authority, “despite declaring in the past that he would not honor patronage appointment requests from lawmakers.”. Not only did Patrick break his promise; he also, in principle, ignored the financial crisis facing the state. You can’t cut some workers and simultaneously give other workers a raise (it’s a good extra $100,000 for her now, moving from the state senator job). That’s by far the easiest way to anger the populace, and from what I have heard from people and read on forums, people don’t really like Patrick that might right now to begin with…

Bad Example 2: Preserving the Kennedy legacy during a recession. Apparently, “More than one out of every five dollars of the $126 million Massachusetts is receiving in earmarks from a $410 billion federal spending package is going to help preserve the legacy of the Kennedys.” What? I don’t even want to read the details. Yes, the Kennedys are important, as is their legacy, but did we forget what time it is right now? The time when other people need that money more? One fifth of $120 million is $24 million. Put in perspective, my high school, Latin Academy, has a $2 million deficit or something like that. In other words, with that money, we could have bailed out twelve schools. And who needs bailing out more than the education system? Should we screw our future over just because our present is bad? Why are we using that money to instead provide a monument for our past than to work toward a better future? The past is gone. The future’s yet to come.

Sources: Macworld, Marco.org
Macworld Article, Marco.org article

Both sites mentioned above speak about the lack of buttons on the new iPod shuffle, among other things. They both bring up a valid, general question: Is Apple going too far with the whole form over function business? Take the point on Marco.org, for example:

There’s a lot of value in simplifying controls, to a point. But nobody was complaining that either the laptop trackpads or the Shuffles had too many buttons before. In both cases, the devices are now worse off than they were before, but they look a bit cooler.

I don’t know about the laptops being worse, but I would agree that the shuffle is worse at least at the slightest due to the lack of buttons. The shuffle’s buttonless design and the diagram they have to put up to show you how to work the thing (see the third picture of the Macworld article) is crazy. I guess one could get used to it, but to throw such memorization at the average user and to oversimplify something just for the sake of getting rid of buttons that looked just fine? Isn’t this unnecessary? People don’t generally go through all that reading to figure out how things work; intuition is key. Tapping something three times to go backward is not intuitive. A button marked with two backward, tailless arrows, though? Anyone that’s operated something that works with playback will understand that has something to do with going in reverse.

The point that got me the most on the Macworld article:

The decision to put the controls on the headphones means that unless Apple opens up the controls to third parties, you can’t even play music on the iPod without using Apple’s own earbuds. What happens if, as is also not unheard of, Apple’s stock earbuds break? Your iPod is completely useless until you get another pair of approved headphones.

Not that I’m an iPod shuffle person anyway, but this wouldn’t make me any more of one nor would it make me want to tell anyone else to get one. It’s prettier, sure, but a step backward overall.