Sir Terry Pratchett was one of two people who I quoted directly in my dissertation. This line from Feet of Clay was the motto for my introductory chapter:
"This is where we’ve filled ourselves up with so many questions that they’re starting to overflow and become answers."
It resonated with me, because this is what doing research often feels like for me.
#Teachers and #academicmastodon :
Does anyone have a good substitute recommendation for using live google docs in the classroom, something that is privacy-conscious?
I often use a live #Google Doc, and sometimes a spreadsheet, having students work on tasks as a class.
Getting away from Google, Microsoft, etc. is the goal here but also preserving student #privacy. Even better if no login is required at all.
Aside from something like an Etherpad, most of the options seem to lead back to the big companies. Firing up my own #Etherpad instance might be an end goal but I won't get to that until summer...
Any suggestions? Please feel free to boost.
Shout-out to my colleagues from Leiden University, University of Applied Sciences Leiden, and mboRijnland, who are striking today in Leiden and The Hague.
They are protesting the announced budget cuts on higher education, and represent the start of a staggered Higher Education strike that will continue at least for the coming five weeks or so.
#AcademicMastodon What is a good introductory book for qualitative methodologies? With more focus on social sciences (Interviews, thematic analysis, etc.).
Can anyone tell me what the availability/uptime and usability for Codeberg is these days?
Edit: here's a link to https://codeberg.org/
I am considering migrating all my open source projects there but have heard there were issues in the past.
This is so well stated. So many faculty in the US have concerns right now about our research staff, the staff that manages grands and facilities, and our students: https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottwhite/2025/02/15/the-hidden-cost-of-freezing-indirect-research-funding/ #uspol #nih #research #AcademicMastodon
I've been talking to my students a lot this week about things like:
* How do you all talk with each other these days?
* What social media apps are in and out?
* Where do you get your news?
I'm doing this mostly bc I have a few ideas for projects to raise awareness among students about EVERYTHING, but also bc I'm just always interested in this stuff. I probably do this once a semester.
So here's what I've learned:
1/?
I keep getting told I should make a professional webpage for my work and to raise my profile, but 1) I'm not very professional; 2) that sounds a lot like work, and I'd rather not.
On Monday morning, universities & hospitals will wake up with way less money to pay bills with than they had on Friday, due to a late Friday NIH memo from the Trump administration slashing NIH grant "indirect costs."
@STAT explains what indirect costs are, how this will decrease American scientific dominance, & whether this is illegal:
Breaking: The Trump administration slashes indirect costs on NIH grants to 15%.
This will "grind our scientific complex to a halt," said a UCSD virologist.
"We’ll be working in the dark," said a UC Berkeley dean—literally: This money goes toward electric bills.
https://www.statnews.com/2025/02/07/nih-slashes-indirect-costs-on-all-grants-to-15-percent-trump/
Great news for University of #Groningen staff - you can now add your #Mastodon handle to your official university profile pages!
This makes it easier for colleagues and students to find and connect with you on the #Fediverse.
Next week I'm off to DOKORP, the Dortmund Conference on Spatial and Planning Research. This year, everything revolves around the topic of “Planning in times of multiple crises”. Who of you will also be there? You are welcome to drop by in the track on “Mobility and Transport”, where I will give a few insights into my current research.
https://raumplanung.tu-dortmund.de/en/events-transfer/dortmund-conference/dokorp-2025/
#UrbanPlanning #Transportation
#Mobility #AcademicMastodon #AcademicChatter
I'm hearing that most normal NSF grants are okay.
But for postdocs directly funded through the NSF, the portal remains frozen.
Rent, credit cards, bills—early-career scientists live paycheck to paycheck, & the federal freeze that arguably never was is still disrupting lives & research.
by @STAT's Eric Boodman:
https://www.statnews.com/2025/01/30/trump-funding-freeze-national-science-foundation-suspends-salary-payments/
Morning #train from #Marseille St-Charles.
It’s going to be a long day traveling with 4 trains (without accounting for the public transport in big cities).
Guess what’s my final #destination ?
Clue: not in France
Of course, I could have done the same with just a couple planes in half a day, but other solutions are need to limit #ClimateChange.
(Picture is blurred on purpose)
Does anyone know of a tutorial/guide that I could use to set someone up for marking up documents digitally while #reading?
Here's what I mean:
I have a lot of students who only/primarily read digitally. They don't have printers, typically won't print out sources.
I've learned to work with that in a lot of ways, but *in class* we mark up sources on paper regularly, and I encourage students to take this action and apply it in their own reading at home. So there's a disconnect between the physical practice in the classroom and how some students are likely to do things at home.
I have all sorts of annotation tools for digital stuff, and notetaking tools that include PDF markup tools, but what I'm looking for is a guide that sets someone up for doing digital scribbling naturally, just as part of everyday reading for coursework: the best software to use, but also best practices, ways to make it more natural, easier.
Does anything like that exist?
WANTED: Lehrkräfte für Interview gesucht!
Wir suchen Lehrkräfte, die mit #OER arbeiten und diese für #Demokratiebildung und die Vermittlung demokratischer Werte im Unterricht nutzen.
Geplant ist ein kleines Interview, schriftlich ODER mündlich.
VÖ: Mitte März
Falls sich jemand nicht als Lehrkraft identifiziert, aber dennoch einen Bezug zum Thema hat, nicht scheuen sich bei uns zu melden!
@dipf_aktuell
Some scholarly journal articles include links to share the articles on #socialmedia.
For example, here's an article with links to share it on #X and #Facebook. (Scroll to the bottom.)
https://insightsimaging.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s13244-024-01801-w
I don't think I've ever seen a journal use sharing links for #Mastodon or #Bluesky. Have you?
If some journals are doing this, is anyone keeping track of them? Is anyone systematically encouraging them?
Here's letter encouraging journals to add sharing links for Bluesky — but failing to mention Mastodon.
https://www-nature-com.ezp-prod1.hul.harvard.edu/articles/d41586-024-04191-7
#Academia #AcademicMastodon #AcademicBluesky
@academicchatter
