I’ve been running this blog on GitHub Pages with Octopress for nearly three months now. Since Octopress is built on Jekyll, a static site generator, I’ve been thinking that there are other ways of hosting static files that may be worth experimenting with.

So, I’m hosting a copy of this site on nearlyfreespeech.net as an experiment. We’ll see how it goes.

Adapted from food.com

1. Place oven rack in the center of the oven. Place eggs on the racks.
2. Place a cookie sheet (lined with foil!) underneath the eggs… just in case one explodes, cracks, or leaks while cooking.
3. Set oven to 325 °F for 30 minutes.
4. Remove eggs from oven and place in ice-cold water. Peel as soon as they are cool enough to handle, then return to the water to thoroughly chill.

Tips and Suggestions

• How many eggs? About a dozen is about right. Too few (less than six) and you’re probably better off with a pot of water; too many (two dozen or more) and your oven will be a bit crowded.
• No ice? Instead, place the bowl in the sink, and leave the water running over the eggs.
• Too many hard-boiled eggs? Try making egg salad!

1. Coarsely chop 6 hard-boiled eggs. A butter knife works well for this.
2. Add 2 tablespoons mayonaise.
3. Mix well. Serve.

Tips and Suggestions

• For the adventureous, try adding a dash of curry or paprika before mixing.
• Real mayonaise is better than “salad dressing”.
• Some like to add finely chopped celery to egg salad. I find it messes up the texture, but your mileage may vary.

_I originally wrote this article for

Volume 118, Issue 6 of mathNEWS._

We see that in [1], Kalpin continues to detail his wild and unscientific proposals for the post-secondary school system. While it’s apparent that Kalpin is clearly unqualified to be proposing such changes, we also note that there are any details that need to be worked out in his proposal.

Kalpin notes that secondary school is unable “to adequately direct students to a correct post-secondary path” and unable to prepare students for post-secondary education. His approach, dividing students into four streams in 9th grade, is clearly out of touch with the issues plaguing “typical” high school students.

The ministry of education itself notes in [2] that in 2003-2004, nearly 1 in 3 students failed to complete a secondary school diploma, let alone advance to university. For the 2009-2010 year, that has only improved to 1 in 5 students. This means that nearly 20% of students will be forced to navigate the world with whatever skills that, at worst, they have acquired in elementary school.

Kalpin introducing integrals and linear algebra into the high school curriculum, where students already struggle with the pace at which concepts are introduced. While the secondary school system once did introduce such concepts, they did so when OAC, the fifth year of high school, still existed, and there was sufficient time for high-school students to absorb such concepts and still be well-rounded when they graduated. Introducing such concepts to the exclusion of other classes (such as Computer Science or Visual Arts) could severely hinder a student’s ability to apply the results of upper-year courses like CS 488/688.

Kalpin proposes two radical changes to provide enough funding for his radical changes: the abolishment of the Catholic school system, and the removal of all-day kindergarten. We note that many the Catholic school system, arguably, is better able to promote STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) skills in young children – as demonstrated by the sheer number of catholic (and, for that matter, french immersion) schools that participate in STEM programs such as the FIRST Lego League and FIRST Robotics Competition, compared to the number of public schools that do so.

With regards to the removal of all-day kindergarten, we note that all-day kindergarten gives one more time to build social and soft skills in early childhood, where early childhood educators can intervene as necessary. Underdeveloped soft skills are a leading rationale for programs such as PDEng. Besides, wouldn’t you love more time to play with your friends?

Once again, we note how unfeasible such broad sweeping changes would be. Instead, I repeat my plea for disruptive changes to education from the bottom up. Apply for a Winter 2013 internship with the Khan Academy. Apply to Desire2Learn on JobMine. Apply to VeloCity, and disrupt the world with your own startup in the education industry.

Something more than just writing a whiny article in the paper. Anything. Please. I’ve done my part; and I hope you’ll do yours.

!able

[1] J. Kalpin, “Why High School is Too Easy Part 2: Fixes to the System,” The Iron Warrior, vol. 33, no. 5, pp. 9, Mar. 2012.

[2] http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/document/nr/11.03/bg0308.html

Today, fourth-year Software Engineering students showed off the fourth-year design projects they’ve been working on over the last three terms, demonstrating the scope of what they’ve learned over the past five years they’ve spent at the University of Waterloo.

Michael’s Picks

For future reference, here are a few that I liked:

Team 5: Synthesizing Iterators from Declarative Abstraction Functions (Whyness)

• Research-focused
• Code that generates code
• Elegant poster

Team 6: Locally Integrated Multi-Brain Systems (Causal)

• Pretty colours!
• Real client: professor from political science dept.
• Feels like “magic”
• Clever undo/redo architecture to handle black-box components (not just command or memento patterns)

Team 7: Pathways (Deferred)

• Proxy client: real client in London, UK; local professor with domain knowledge represented during meetings
• Replicated diagrams shown in client’s research papers; added graphical editing (direct manip.)

Team 10: Verifyy

• Chopsticks (tactile prop) for demo – keeps visitors engaged

Team 18: Chronostation (Symphony)

• Branching undo/redo/replay for learning how to draw
• Reasonably simple mental model
• Rough around the edges wrt UX, but functionally complete

Tips From 4Bs

• Start early
• Choose members based on shared interests
  • Temptation to choose people you already know
  • Friends might not be equally invested in your project ideas / your interests
    • Work might not be distributed evenly if someone isn’t passionate
• Communicate expectations clearly and regularly
  • What technologies used?
  • Level of familiarity with technologies, on-boarding time
    • e.g. Should you really use django if you’re the only person on your team that knows Python?
  • What got done this week (ala scrum/agile)
• Meet often
  • Living together ⇔ impromptu meetings
  • Telecommuting ⇔ out of sight, out of mind
• Coordinate electives
  • If everyone takes real-time (trains), shared deadlines will be stressful
• Research competitors early
  • Helps avoid late-stage (i.e. 4A) redesigns
• Have a good client
• Ladies: During symposium, wear comfortable shoes (flats, not heels!)
  • Standing for a good eight to ten hours; grad ball the next night in the worst case