There has been a lot of talk about making college education free for students. Usually the proposal involves either a new tax on the rich or cobbling together existing funding streams, adding a little extra money here and there, and saying that college is now free. The prior idea often is dismissed as politically impossible, and the later idea while implemented is misleading at best, as usually it involves little additional funding and doesn’t cover the cost of fees and housing during college.
But maybe the answer exists today with the infrastructure built during the pandemic — remote learning. Let students get full college experience via Zoom or other video lecture. There is no limit on class-size for Zoom lecture, a classroom could span a whole state or even the world for relatively little money compared to old ways of educating. Online tests and quizzes can be automatically graded by a server. Papers and essays could be submitted electronically for review by the professor and adjuncts. For other quizzes and tests, where there is a concern about cheating, local High Schools could be used in the evenings with paid test proctors to administer the tests in a secure environment. Likewise, High Schools could be used in group discussions in the evenings, connecting with the professor over Zoom.
There once was a bias against remote learning and remote work. But the pandemic has struck many of those prejudices down, showing it can work. While part of human connection is lost over Zoom, already many traditional classes were taught in large, impersonal lecture halls. The remote learning infrastructure could be made so much cheaper that it would be easy for states to fund unlimited learning and certification of people wanting to learn new skills to advance their careers, improve their knowledge, or learn more about a subject.
Already, there are many colleges like MIT and Penn State that offers free online lectures and textbooks. It’s a good start, but there is no formal testing or certifications after participating in such courses. But adding this component to learning process could be a very economical way for states to provide free learning to all their citizens. People could gain new skills throughout the careers, advancing the work force and allowing their citizens become more knowledgeable about the world.
Seems like this week is following the exact same pattern as last week, rain Wednesday evening, rain Thursday and Friday with showers and clouds and cool come Saturday. Kind of obnoxious in my book as I like riding into work and I would like to head out of town for the weekend at least the overnight.
Good morning! Happy Rainy Thursday. I know, again, really? Rain and 45 degrees in Delmar, NY. 🌧️ There is a south-southeast breeze at 7 mph. 🍃. I can’t control the weather but I can my attitude. 🤬 It would definitely would be a cold and wet day if I was out camping.
Started the morning with shredded oatmeal and some canned pumpkin 🎃 with a bunch of fried yellow onions🧅 with cornmeal, broccoli 🥦 and eggs 🥚and some garlic. A few cups of coffee ☕ and I’m up and off early to walk laps on the Concourse. 🚶 If it’s going to rain ☔ best to get my steps in early.
Today will have showers before noon, then showers likely with a chance of drizzle, mainly between noon and 1pm. 🌦 High of 46 degrees at 8am. 15 degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around March 19th. Southeast wind 5 to 7 mph. Chance of precipitation is 80%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning, remaining cloudy in the afternoon. The high last year was 51 degrees. The record high of 90 was set in 1976. 2.7 inches of snow fell back in 1887.❄
Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:55 pm with sun having an altitude of 58.4° from the due south horizon (-12.4° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 3.7 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:03 pm with the sun in the west (280°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-northwest (286°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 7:41 pm after setting for 3 minutes with dusk around 8:10 pm, which is one minute and 9 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 At dusk you’ll see the Waxing Gibbous 🌔 Moon in the southeast (141°) at an altitude of 55° from the horizon, 251,515 miles away. 🚀 The best time to look at the stars is after 8:47 pm. At sunset, look for rain showers 🌧 and temperatures around 46 degrees. There will be a calm wind. Tomorrow will have 13 hours and 38 minutes of daytime, an increase of 2 minutes and 42 seconds over today.
Last night I took the bus 🚍 home, made up Johnny cakes 🥞 and oatmeal with pumpkin 🎃 and then went upstairs to do some reading 📖. Ended up stumbling upon a very well narrated video series on statistics and spatial analysis using R by Great Courses on Kanopy from my local library for free 🆓. While I’m fairly experienced in R there is always more to learn. Spatial correlation is something I’m quite interested in but I find it’s a bit of a complicated theory to understand.
Tonight will have a chance of drizzle with a slight chance of showers before 1am. Mostly cloudy 🌧️ , with a low of 41 degrees at 3am. Three degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around April 25th. Light south wind. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2023, we had light rain in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 35 degrees. The record low of 18 occurred back in 1875.
Blusteryand cool this weekend but not so wet. ☀️🌬️Saturday, a slight chance of showers before 8am, then scattered showers after 2pm. Partly sunny, with a high near 60. West wind 9 to 13 mph, with gusts as high as 24 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. Sunday, mostly sunny, with a high near 56. Typical average high for the weekend is 62 degrees.
I am thinking about camping 🏕 locally this weekend if Saturday is half decent so I don’t have to listen to them working on construction 🚧 at the unit next door, even though the new landlord has been good about not running the jack hammer or loud equipment in the weekend and evenings. Still it’s annoying as often they have a lot of equipment on the driveway and I have to ask for them to move it to get our so it might be nice to do a quick overnight. I’m thinking the first or second week of May to do trip out to Schoharie 🚲 and ride the Catskill Scenic Trail once things green up, especially the greener farm section down in Delaware County assuming that it’s not so wet the trail is completely bogged down.
