Student Window

[From time to time we invite guests to blog about initiatives of interest, and are very pleased to have Stephen Savage join us here again. Stephen is Arizona State University's Geo-Archaeological Information Applications Lab IT Manager of the Archaeological Research Institute at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change. You might remember his previous posts about Exploring exploplanets using Google Earth's API or his work on the Digital Archaeological Atlas of the Holy Land .] For years, astronauts and rocket scientists at NASA and JPL have had all the fun. Billions of people on Earth have seen pictures of Apollo 17 astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmidt driving their “dune buggy” on the Moon. Billions more have seen pictures of NASA’s Mars landers, Spirit and Opportunity. We’ve all wished we could be the ones to take these incredible toys out for a spin on the Red Planet or the Moon. Now, thanks to Google, you can do the next best thing — you can drive a virtual rover model on Google’s Mars or Moon (or a skateboard on Earth), and experience the real topography of these places. We at ASU developed a “Drive the Solar System” website where you can explore how the power of Google Mars, Google Moon and Google Earth has been brought to the web. You can put your rover or skateboard down anyplace on Mars, the Moon or Earth and drive it anywhere you want to go. Explore the Apollo landing sites or Olympus Mons, the largest volcanic cone in the solar system. Drive down the Valles Marinaris, the canyon on Mars that dwarfs Arizona’s Grand Canyon, or kick-flip your skateboard down the Amazon. And that’s not all. You can visit all the other planets and the largest moons in the Solar System too. But you can do more than drive or look at these strange new worlds — you can also look at these places in depth with detailed information about each place you can visit included. So if you’ve ever wanted to be an astronaut, visit http://gaialab.asu.edu/ SolarSystem and see what you’ve been missing! Posted by Stephen Savage, Geo-Archaeological Information Applications Lab IT Manager, Archaeological Research Institute, School of Human Evolution and Social Change at Arizona State University

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Driving the Solar System with Google

Ever found yourself being an armchair tourist looking at 3D buildings of your home town in Google Earth? Have you ever wanted to highlight that famous building in your city or on your campus, but not really been sure where to start? Building Maker helps you put buildings on the 3D map. Today we launched Google Building Maker , a fun and simple (and crazy addictive, it turns out) online tool for creating buildings for Google Earth . Basically, you pick a building and construct a model of it using aerial photos and simple 3D shapes – both of which we provide. When you’re done, we take a look at your model. If it looks right, and if a better model doesn’t already exist, we add it to the 3D Buildings layer in Google Earth. Check out this video to see Building Maker in action: For now, you can choose to make buildings in any of about 50 cities. We’ll keep adding more cities, but don’t feel left out if we don’t have your hometown yet — modeling in a place you’ve never been is a fantastic way to discover more about it. Simply, make sure you have the latest version of Google Earth installed on your computer. If you’re on a Mac, you will need to download the Google Earth plug-in directly. Building Maker is free and available in 14 languages. Go to www.google.com/buildingmaker to join the worldwide mapping community. Have fun! Posted by Mark Limber, Product Manager and Matt Simpson, User Experience Designer

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Introducing Google Building Maker

The table of “ discovery ” of the tools available to the parties in a civil case to trial, the presentation is one of the strongest, the ability of lawyers from one side to a virtual interview of potential witnesses, often at their desks in the law … With the consent of the Nesson, the 25-year-old student in physics from Boston University has shown for the deposits plated at a Red Sox jersey is attacking pit, attorneys in the Denver team in the city, Major League Baseball …

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Construction of the Public, Part I | Mygolfbar

Almost six years after a lawsuit forced the city to pledge to keep better track of students who leave public schools without graduating, the number leaving high schools has continued to climb, according to a report to be released Thursday by the public advocate’s office. Skip to next paragraph The report raises questions about why more than 20 percent of students from the class of 2007 were discharged — the term for students who leave the school system without graduating — but 17.5 percent from the class of 2000 were. Much of the increase has come from students who are discharged in the ninth grade, which has gone up to 7.5 percent for the class of 2007, but was 3.8 percent in 2000. Though students can be classified as discharged for a number of benign reasons, including a transfer to a private school or a move out of the city, the Education Department has been sued several times for pushing out students who are struggling and are unlikely to graduate, a practice that can help raise the school’s test-score averages and graduation rates. In 2003, Chancellor Joel I. Klein called the effect of the practice a “tragedy,” and when the lawsuit was settled in the fall of that year, the department began requiring all schools to interview students before they can transfer to other programs. The report was written by Jennifer L. Jennings, a doctoral student at Columbia University, and Leonie Haimson, a frequent critic of Chancellor Klein and the executive director of Class Size Matters, an advocacy group that urges more checks on mayoral control of the schools. The report is being released at a time when the State Legislature is to consider extending the 2002 mayoral control law. Betsy Gotbaum, the public advocate, said the findings supported her call, issued in the fall of last year, for an independent research board to monitor the Education Department. “I don’t think anything has gotten any better,” Ms. Gotbaum said Wednesday. “The numbers explaining where these students go is certainly at best questionable and at least a bit wrong. We really don’t understand what all these numbers mean.” Ms. Gotbaum said she asked on Wednesday that the state comptroller’s office audit the city’s graduation and discharge numbers. David Cantor, a spokesman for the City Education Department, said that while the increases were noteworthy, they reflected the fact that the student population often moves in and out of the city. He said the city’s graduation rate, which is affected by the number of students who drop out but not those discharged, has improved steadily over the last six years. For the class of 2008, the projected discharge rate is 19.2 percent, Mr. Cantor said. Mr. Cantor said the city’s graduation rates and discharges were audited annually by Ernst & Young. One of the most alarming trends, according to the report, is the number of ninth-grade students who are discharged. “This finding is of serious concern, as the goal of the public school system is to provide all students with the support needed to persist and successfully graduate from high school,” the report states, adding, “Schools may be responding to accountability incentives to discharge students earlier in their high school careers.” Jennifer Bell-Ellwanger, a senior adviser to the chancellor who oversees research, said department officials had noticed the increase in ninth-grade discharges and were trying to determine its cause. According to data provided by the Education Department, roughly 74 percent of the more than 18,000 students discharged from the class of 2007 went to a school outside New York City. But according to the report, there is no evidence in census data to suggest that so many teenagers have left New York in recent years. The department has also reported that the number of high school students transferring to parochial schools has increased over time; there were 2,084 such transfers for the class of 2007, but 821 for the class of 2004, for example. But the report also uses data from the state’s Education Department showing that the enrollment in parochial schools appears largely flat. The report also finds that far more black and Hispanic students are discharged than white and Asian students, and far more boys than girls.

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Number of Students Leaving School Early Continues to Increase, Study Says

Collection of the best toilets around the world. It dares you to visit and try to pee and poo in the amazing toilet spots in the world. AwesomeToilet THE LADY IS GETTING READY TO ENTER!! This is a picture of a public toilet in Houston � Now that you’ve seen the outside view, take a look at the inside view… It’s made entirely of one-way glass! � No one can see you from the outside, but when you are inside it’s like sitting in a clear glass box! Now would you…. COULD YOU….??? � BATHROOM PAINTED FLOOR!!! IMAGINE YOU ARE AT A PARTY . Tenth floor of a hi-rise building….. AND THEN YOU HAVE TO VISIT THE BATHROOM…. You open the door… NOW, REMEMBER THE �FLOOR IS JUST A PAINTED �FLOOR ! KINDA �TAKES YOUR BREATH AWAY….. DOESN’T �IT? Scroll sloooooooowly. ………. � Would this mess up your mind??? �Would you be able to walk �in To �this bathroom??? THIS IS A �CEILING MURAL IN A SMOKER’S LOUNGE. � Please share with friends with a sense of humor�.

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Awesome Toilet

Cheerleading story submitted By Kelly- “Through Cheerleading, I don’t only have more school spirit, but I am a better friend and get along much better with others through my experiences.” How Cheerleading Has Made Me a Better Person by Kelly My mom’s side of the family is FULL of cheerleaders. My cousins have all been cheerleaders in high school, and two of them were captains. I, naturally, wanted to cheer too. I went to a different school in 8th grade, and was so excited to cheer! However, I found out that I couldn’t because the uniforms had already been ordered and the choreographer had already made up the dance for their competition later that year. I was very upset, but I didn’t it get me down. Instead, I helped coach the 7th grade squad. Through doing that, I learned everything I needed to know to tryout for my Freshman year. I remember showing up in the big high school gym for the first day of practice. I was so nervous, and walking along with my two best friends who had been cheering for two years, thinking about how they would make it and I wouldn’t. Two days later, after tryouts, the phone rang. It was the Varsity coach. “Hi, we’d just like to congratulate you and welcome you to the JV squad.” I was so excited, the first person I called was Sarah. She hadn’t gotten a phone call. Neither had Jessie. Camp was tons of fun. I met so many other girls from other grade schools that would be a freshman with me that year. We learned so much and had so much fun. By the end of the year, after soccer, football, and basketball seasons, I was already preparing for tryouts for the next year, which would be in May. This time, I would be trying out for Varsity. My coach had urged all of the girls from the JV squad that were coming back to go ahead and try for Varsity. So all five of us did. Three made it. The other two, which were my friend Beth and myself, were left to take the load of handling the JV squad. Camp this year, however, was a MESS! Beth was in Georgia, my friends Katie and Jackie, who had already been a cheerleader in grade school, did not know the cheers that we used, and then we were left with 8 new incoming freshmen. It was a nightmare. I was elected captain at camp, and I was so excited. I had wanted to be captain since last year! I thought everything was going to come together and I would bring this squad to the top. However, I was so very wrong. We were behind schedule by the time school started, I had to reteach cheers to the girls who had missed practices, I constantly fought with my co-captain, I hated every single one of those girls at one point in time, people were always late, they would get mad if they didn’t get to fly the stunt they wanted to, the got jealous of each other, and pep rallies were worst of all. Then, a week before our last pep rally, Beth dropped off. We had to make up an entirely new pep rally (which, by the way, was soooooo AWESOME and totally showed the pommers who really has more talent at our school. But somehow or another, we pulled through, finally worked together, and actually had fun. So here I am, sitting here typing away at my computer when I should be stretching!! I have tryouts this year, and this time, I WILL be on Varsity. As for the rest of you, don’t be discouraged if you don’t make it the first time. It’s always worth going back and trying again. Just cheer your heart out, and most of all, have fun.

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How Cheerleading Has Made Me a Better Person