Monthly Archives: August 2024

Anthropology students present their research in poetry, plays and op-eds in this course

Anthropology students present their research in poetry, plays and op-eds in this course

Title of course: Multimodal Anthropology What prompted the idea for the course? “Multimodal” simply means using more than academic written text to present research findings. My first multimodal science project was a third grade project on humpback whales, which was inspired by a vinyl LP recording of their “songs” that National Geographic mailed out to subscribers. In […] … learn more→

Talking out of school: counting the cost of return-to-office mandates

Talking out of school: counting the cost of return-to-office mandates

In a recent post on world.edu , two anonymous authors decry the universities’ rush to wind back work-from-home arrangements that were instituted during the COVID crisis. In particular, the authors argue that return-to-office (RTO) arrangements are counterproductive for introverts. Their post adopts a widely-accepted definition of an introvert as someone who finds social encounters taxing, rather than energising, […] … learn more→

What is ‘model collapse’? An expert explains the rumours about an impending AI doom

What is ‘model collapse’? An expert explains the rumours about an impending AI doom

Artificial intelligence (AI) prophets and newsmongers are forecasting the end of the generative AI hype, with talk of an impending catastrophic “model collapse”. But how realistic are these predictions? And what is model collapse anyway? Discussed in 2023, but popularised more recently, “model collapse” refers to a hypothetical scenario where future AI systems get progressively dumber due to the increase of […] … learn more→

An exposé of whatever-it-takes culture, Eric Beecher’s The Men Who Killed the News is an idealistic book for the times

An exposé of whatever-it-takes culture, Eric Beecher’s The Men Who Killed the News is an idealistic book for the times

Eric Beecher is a rare beast: a combination of journalist, media owner and idealist. In 1984, aged 33, he became the youngest-ever editor of the Sydney Morning Herald and he has worked around the world as a journalist. He is currently chair and the largest shareholder in Private Media, owner of several Australian news websites, […] … learn more→

Meta just closed a vital online research tool. It’s bad news for the fight against misinformation

Meta just closed a vital online research tool. It’s bad news for the fight against misinformation

For more than a decade, researchers and journalists have relied on a digital tool called CrowdTangle to track and fight the spread of viral falsehoods online. But earlier this week, the owner of CrowdTangle, Meta, shut the tool down. The tech giant has replaced it with its new Content Library, which it says will serve the […] … learn more→

Common mistakes in academic writing: Top pitfalls to avoid

Common mistakes in academic writing: Top pitfalls to avoid

Academic writing can be challenging, even for experienced scholars. You may find yourself making common mistakes that undermine the quality and credibility of your work. Recognizing and avoiding these errors will significantly improve your academic writing skills. Common Grammatical Mistakes Subject-Verb Agreement Errors Subject-verb agreement is essential for clear communication in academic writing. Errors occur […] … learn more→

Students with mental health struggles linked to absenteeism and lower grades, showing clear need for more in-school support

Students with mental health struggles linked to absenteeism and lower grades, showing clear need for more in-school support

Parents are reporting worse mental health for their children than they did a decade ago, but different groups of children are struggling with mental health in markedly different ways. That’s what our team at the University of Southern California’s Center for Applied Research in Education found using a widely used mental health screening measure. More specifically, we found […] … learn more→

3 strategies to help college students pick the right major the first time around and avoid some big hassles

3 strategies to help college students pick the right major the first time around and avoid some big hassles

Not long after new college students have finished choosing the college that is right for them, they are asked to declare an academic major. For some students, this decision is easy, as their majors may have actually influenced their choice of college. Unfortunately, this decision is not always an easy one to make, and college students […] … learn more→

Education in the Anthropocene: addressing the environmental crisis means learning about our place in Earth’s history

Education in the Anthropocene: addressing the environmental crisis means learning about our place in Earth’s history

Education should prepare young people to face the challenges of their time. To keep up with the changing world, this means that education has to keep adjusting. But unfortunately, our education systems have fallen out of sync with the times. Environmental decay is arguably the greatest challenge facing humanity today. However, education systems are failing to […] … learn more→