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  1. Colleges disappearing

    Entry #118
    Brian Winkel
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    We have been working on building emailing lists to contact folks around the country (indeed, world) about our Student Competition Using Differential Equation Modeling – SCUDEM to be held on 21 April 2018. We are trying to line up host sites for SCUDEM 2018 and so we are working on...

  2. What do you do on your first day of class?

    Entry #117
    Brian Winkel
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    I invited my son, Doan Winkel, to share what he does in his Entrepreneurship class on the first day of class. Doan is The John J. Kahl, Sr., Chair in Entrepreneurship, at John Carroll University in Cleveland Heights OH USA.  Here is what he does. ---------  **** ---------- What...

  4. This says it all - student feedback

    Entry #113
    Brian Winkel
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    Just check this out from Math in the City at University of Nebraska home page. First line under Student Feedback: "I liked the fact that we didn't know what we were capable of doing until we did it." This says it all. Makes it worthwhile. End of Blog Entry  

  6. Grateful to MAA FOCUS

    Entry #111
    Brian Winkel
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    We are very grateful to Jacqueline Jensen-Vallin, Editor of MAA FOCUS, for publishing our article, Let's Do It:  Using Modeling in the Classroom, in the April/May 2017 issue of the magazine. The piece can be found (along with all the other newsy and rich articles in ALL the other online...

  7. How to Run Effective Meetings

    Entry #110
    Brian Winkel
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    In our profession of faculty members (most folks who are reading this blog) we attend our share of meetings - I can hear the groans in the ether coming across the miles and into the speakers of my desk computer! Well, Adam Bryant, who writes the weekly Corner Office column in The New York Times...

  9. Mindfulness at Work

    Entry #107
    Brian Winkel
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    In a helpful piece entitled "Achieving Mindfulness at Work, No Meditation Cushion Required," in the New York Times, Job Market section of 24 April 2016, Matthew E. May suggests that we can do just that and furthermore it will make us a better contributor at work and a person richer in...

  12. Your Students Crave Moral Simplicity. Resist.

    Entry #101
    Brian Winkel
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    Lyell Asher, an Associate Professor of English at Lewis & Clark College, has written a very fine piece, "Your Students Crave Moral Simplicity.  Resist." in The Chronicle of Higher Education, 10 February 2017 issue, pp. B3-B5. The theme of the article surrounds his assignment...

  13. The UMAP Journal

    Entry #100
    Brian Winkel
    0 comments

    In a recent correspondence with Paul Campbell, of Beloit College, Beloit WI, who is the  Editor of The UMAP Journal, Paul said that he hoped SIMIODE community members would take note of the opportunity to share modeling activities in the journal's Model Reality Check section. One...

  14. What makes it great?

    Entry #99
    Brian Winkel
    0 comments

    My wife and I attend many musical events each year. One series we like is entitled, "What Makes It Great." These lecture/concerts are held in the Merkin Concert Hall of the Kaufman Music Center in Manhattan, New York City. Each of the four events is two-part. For the first hour or so...

  15. A sock came back from "the other side"

    Entry #97
    Brian Winkel
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        I had four pairs of compression socks per my doctor's suggestion so that circulation in my legs would be better. They are not cheap, but do they make me more comfortable as they keep down the swelling. Several months ago one of the socks went over to "the other...

  16. "I don't ask questions any more . . .

    Entry #96
    Brian Winkel
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    . . .  because  I don't like the answers I get."  That is what a woman of a certain age said to the receptionist at the doctor's office today while I was waiting in the waiting room. I got to thinking about what causes us "not to ask...

  17. The real meaning of what we produce and do

    Entry #95
    Brian Winkel
    0 comments

    Tonight my wife and I attended a lecture performance on Dimitri Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 8 as a part of the “What Makes It Great” series offered by Rob Kapilow at the Merkin Concert Hall in New York City. We tend to shy away from twentieth century music because of it...

  18. Issues of coverage raised all the time

    Entry #94
    Brian Winkel
    0 comments

    We recently re-examined the 3" by 5" feedback cards we collected from attendees at our JMM 2016 SIMIODE Open House and we share them with our thoughts with you. Under the theme "Issues to Overcome" we found the following: How do you fit it in? What do you drop? Do...

  19. Students generating examples

    Entry #93
    Brian Winkel
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    In the current (15 November 2016) posting of the MAA Teaching Tidbits Blog, Dana Ernst, Northern Arizona University, writes, “Who generates the examples?”   Dana is suggesting that students can demonstrate their knowledge very well by creating examples and problems. He...

  20. Let go and take risks

    Entry #92
    Brian Winkel
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    "Let go and take risks."  Advice we give our students on occasion, advice our parents suggested to us (sometimes in frustration and with anxiety), and advice we need to take ourselves. As professors we are always doing just that, "professing." This is a kind of preaching...