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The Open Classroom
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Spring 2004 / Vol. 4, No. 2
Like automotive models, women's hemlines, and children's toys, pedagogical fads come and go, causing an immediate stir but rarely influencing teaching practice in any significant way. The notion that every innovation dreamed up by reformers inside and outside public schools makes its way into the nation's classrooms is popular among those hunting for reasons to malign the schools. But it is crucial to distinguish between mere intellectual chatter and ideas that provoke substantive change.
Where on this spectrum does the idea of the "open classroom" lie? At first glance, it would seem to be just another fad. It burst onto the American education scene in the late 1960s, only to fade away by the late 1970s. Appearances, however, can be deceiving.
British Invasion
The open-classroom movement originated in British public elementary schools after World War II. The movement, known then as informal education, spread slowly to the United States. In 1967 a parliamentary commission headed by Lady Bridget Plowden published a report, Children and Their Primary Schools, that promoted open education in all British schools. American educators who visited British schools during the late 1960s had read the Plowden report and visited classrooms where informal education dominated teaching and learning. They viewed informal education–or, as they came to call it, open classrooms or open education–as an answer to both the American education system's critics and the problems of U.S. society.
For more than a decade, U.S. schools had been subjected to withering attacks, blamed for everything from the launch of Sputnik to urban decay. They were faulted for not developing enough engineers and scientists; for being racially segregated and hostile to disadvantaged children; and for producing uncreative graduates who seldom questioned authority. Critics thought that the schools could be the vehicle for winning the Cold War, furthering the civil rights struggle, and roiling a 1950s culture of conformity that suffocated imagination.
Open classrooms' focus on students' "learning by doing" resonated with those who believed that America's formal, teacher-led classrooms were crushing students' creativity. In that sense the open-classroom movement mirrored the social, political, and cultural changes of the 1960s and early 1970s. The era saw the rise of a youth-oriented counterculture and various political and social movements–the civil-rights movement, antiwar protests, feminist and environmental activism–that questioned traditional seats of authority, including the way classrooms and schools were organized and students were taught.
In both Britain and the United States, open classrooms contained no whole-class lessons, no standardized tests, and no detailed curriculum. The best of the open classrooms had planned settings where children came in contact with things, books, and one another at "interest centers" and learned at their own pace with the help of the teacher. Teachers structured the classroom and activities for individual students and small work groups. They helped students negotiate each of the reading, math, science, art, and other interest centers on the principle that children learn best when they are interested and see the importance of what they are doing.
Consider the scene from a 3rd-grade open classroom in a New York City elementary school described by two proponents, Walter and Miriam Schneir, in a 1971 New York Times Magazine article:
What is most striking is that there are no desks for pupils or teachers. Instead, the room is arranged as a workshop.
Carelessly draped over the seat, arm, and back of a big old easy chair are three children, each reading to himself. Several other children nearby sprawl comfortably on a covered mattress on the floor, rehearsing a song they have written and copied into a song folio.
One grouping of tables is a science area with . . . magnets, mirrors, a prism, magnifying glasses, a microscope. . . . Several other tables placed together and surrounded by chairs hold a great variety of math materials such as "geo blocks," combination locks, and Cuisenaire rods, rulers, and graph paper. . . . The teacher sits down at a small round table for a few minutes with two boys, and they work together on vocabulary with word cards. . . . Children move in and out of the classroom constantly.
Schools without Walls
As the idea of open education gained momentum, thousands of elementary-school classrooms became home-like settings where young children moved from one attractive learning center for math to another for art. Additional learning centers engaged them in science, reading, and writing lessons. Teams of teachers worked with multiage groups of students and created elementary schools where children were no longer assigned to grade levels. Some school districts started alternative open education programs at the high-school level and gave teachers discretion to create new academic courses where students directed their own learning, worked in the community, and pursued intellectual interests. At both the elementary and secondary levels, open education meant teachers were acting more as coaches in helping students than as bosses directing children in every activity.
Avid promoters of open education commissioned architects to build schools without walls. Teams of teachers worked collaboratively with one another, using movable dividers to reconfigure the open space for large- and small-group projects and individual study.
By the early 1970s, the phrase open classrooms dominated educators' vocabularies. Even though parents and practitioners found it hard to pin down exactly what open education meant, many school boards adopted open-education programs, and open-space schools were built across the country. Few superintendents or principals could risk saying aloud that they had neither heard of the innovation nor found it desirable without risking sneers from peers or criticism from bosses.
So many schools were adopting the physical attributes of open classrooms that some advocates wondered whether the spirit of informal education was truly being followed. In his 1973 book The Open Classroom Reader, Charles Silberman warned enthusiastic teachers and parents:
By itself, dividing a classroom into interest areas does not constitute open education; creating large open spaces does not constitute open education; individualizing instruction does not constitute open education. . . . For the open classroom . . . is not a model or set of techniques, it is an approach to teaching and learning.
The artifacts of the open classroom–interest areas, concrete materials, wall displays–are not ends in themselves but rather means to other ends. . . . In addition, open classrooms are organized to encourage:
• Active learning rather than passive learning;
• Learning and expression in a variety of media, rather than just pencil and paper and the spoken word;
• Self-directed, student-initiated learning more than teacher-directed learning.
Just a few years later, however, the ground shifted. In the mid-1970s, with the economy stagnating and the nation deeply divided over the Vietnam War, critics again trained their sights on the public schools. The national crisis gave rise to a perception, amplified by the media, that academic standards had slipped, that the desegregation movement had failed, and that urban schools were becoming violent places. This time the call was not for open education but for a return to the basics, again mirroring general social trends–namely, the conservative backlash against the cultural and political changes of the 1960s and early 1970s.
Traditional schools sprang up in suburbs and cities. Open-space schools rebuilt their walls. States tried to raise academic standards by developing minimum competency tests that high-school students had to pass in order to receive a diploma. Citations in the media and academic journals indicate that interest in open classrooms peaked somewhere around 1974. By the early 1980s, open classrooms had already become a footnote in doctoral dissertations.
But were open classrooms just another fad? Perhaps in the sense that, like hula hoops and pet rocks, they had soared onto the scene and then disappeared without a trace. Considering them merely a fad, however, would miss the deeper meaning of open classrooms as yet another skirmish in the ideological wars that have split educators and the public since the first tax-supported schools opened their doors in the early 1800s.
The School Wars
For at least two centuries, competing traditions of teaching reading, math, citizenship, and morality have fired policy debates and occasionally touched classroom practices. In teacher-centered instruction, knowledge is often (but not always) "presented" to a learner (via lectures, textbooks, and testing) who is–and the metaphors vary–a "blank slate" or a "vessel to fill." In student-centered instruction, by contrast, knowledge is often (but not always) "discovered" by the learner (via individual and small-group work, projects blending different subjects and skills, and inquiry and questioning), who may be described as "rich clay in the hands of an artist" or "a flourishing garden in need of a masterful cultivator." On the whole, different forms of teacher-centered instruction have dominated U.S. classrooms for the past century.
However, major challenges to teacher-centered instruction were mounted at the beginning of the 20th century by "pedagogical progressives," to use Lawrence Cremin's apt phrase; in the 1960s by enthusiasts for open education; and again in the late 1980s and early 1990s by neoprogressives committed to integrated curricula, performance-based assessments (rather than standardized tests), and smaller schools. Nevertheless, a wide gap remained between ideas and actual practice. Among educators, mainstream classroom practices remained teacher-centered, even if substantial numbers of teachers–trained by progressive faculty members–grasped pieces of the student-centered tradition and created hybrid practices.
The present moment in American education, with its emphasis on standards-based curricula and test-based accountability, surely favors the teacher-centered crowd. Nevertheless, many teachers, particularly in elementary schools, continue to prize active student involvement, cross-disciplinary projects completed by small groups, and similar activities. And even full-fledged open education is still thriving in schools across the country, from the Los Angeles Open Charter School to the Irwin Avenue Open Elementary in North Carolina's Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district. Many teachers and principals still embrace the principles of open education, but keep their heads low to avoid incoming fire.
In high schools, most teachers continue to use teacher-centered practices, leavened slightly by informal practices that have crept into their repertoires. Yet activists in the small-schools movement carry the torch of open education and progressive practices from earlier generations.
Why this long-running ideological war over the best ways to teach reading, math, civic engagement, and character building? The short answer is that these enduring pedagogical quarrels are proxies for deeper political divisions between conservatives and liberals on issues ranging from environmental protection to foreign policy. There are, of course, liberals who believe in traditional education and conservatives who embrace progressive ideas, but the lines are fairly well drawn.
So while the open classroom has clearly disappeared from the vocabulary of educators, another variation of open education is likely to reappear in the years ahead. Deep-seated progressive and traditional beliefs about rearing children, classroom teaching and learning, and the values and knowledge that should be instilled in the next generation will continue to reappear because schools historically have been battlegrounds for solving national problems and working out differences in values.
Since children differ in their motivations, interests, and backgrounds, and learn at different speeds in different subjects, there will never be a victory for either traditional or progressive teaching and learning. The fact is that no single best way for teachers to teach and for children to learn can fit all situations. Both traditional and progressive ways of teaching and learning need to be part of a school's approach to children. Smart teachers and principals have carefully constructed hybrid classrooms and schools that reflect the diversities of children. Alas, that lesson remains to be learned by the policymakers, educators, and parents of each generation.
-Larry Cuban is a professor emeritus of education at Stanford University.
Comment on this article
Your article brings back so many memories, especially "Keep your head low" So many times I advised young teachers in the seventies to do just that if they were serious about integrating the ideas of the open classroom into their teaching. We soon found out that tearing down walls, putting in materials and letting kids loose didn't work, but American education made the mistake that it was the tenets of open ed that were wrong. Instead, it was our lack of understanding of the complexities of the open classroom combined with the willingness of administrators, parents, and probably politicians who were not willing to give teachers the time to change. Sound familiar? It's as if history is repeating itself.
Education will probably always be split between those advocating for child-centered learning and those favoring teacher-directed learning, although I find it hard to see how the latter will provide the kids of today with the skills they need and will need in a rapidly changing world.
I was fortunate enough to be able to found my own school, 30 years ago (The Phoenix School in Salem, MA). We continued to explore and develop our model based on our observations of how kids learned best.
My elementary school was an Open School. Not until researching kindergarten options for my own five-year old did I come to realize this. In discussing it with my husband, I know now how different the experience was from a traditional school. It was a beautiful open building with a large pit in the library area and a mosaic mural depicting important historical events. Reflecting on my experience, it gave me the courage to enroll my daughter in a bilingual kindergarten where she has a different teacher for Language Arts then for her other subjects, and she is in a combined class of Kinder and First Grade for most of the day. From the age of six on I was accustomed to going from teacher to teacher during the day. I think it protects her from having one bad teacher destroy a whole year. I know it worked for me.
I am looking for a list of Open Schools in the US and have found no information on the internet. Can you direct me to a reference?
Thank you.
Middle country central school district has open classrooms in some elementary schools, mccsd.net
[…] students by performance in math, reading, and other subjects rather than what grade they in. Open classrooms flourished in the late-1960s and early 1970s–and this is when The Palace came into […]
Australian follow Simon says (The US)and as a result.Australian school are basically copying this model. It is a fad downunder! It is extremely difficult for the students to focus when they have 3 or 4 rawdy classrooms next to each other. Not to mention how frustrating it can be when 2 teachers withstrong voices speak at the same time!It is a total disaster! Wesimply cannotteach with so much noise and disruptions, but we got to pretend we agree with this idiotic system because the principal has to follow the department latest fad… Which is nothing more than rubbish… I truly hope this comes to an end soon!
[…] Cuban's very readable account of the popularity of the open classroom idea in the US in the 1970s and the subsequent backlash […]
[…] Cuban, L. (2004). The Open Classroom. EducationNext. Retrieved 14 August 2012 from http://educationnext.org/theopenclassroom/ […]
I remember visiting an Open Classroom in 1972. It was awful. The noise level was too much for me. I questioned why does one size fit all? It seems we are always jumping on these bandwagons "a blast from the past" programs. Our district is planning to spend money on two Open classroom schools….God help us!
What I have read about OC is that they do not give standardized testing..how will that fit into today's society of test taking…the common core?
I have read these comments with goose pimples all over my body. I taught in London 1967-April 1973. I was a very successful open education teacher in an infant school in London Borough of Newham. Visitors from many countries visited to see the Integrated Day in practice.
Although I retired many years now I am still being called to assist as a Consultant for early Childhood Education. I can only wish and hope that before I die, I will hear again that early childhood educators will once again reintroduce the open education.
I think that there are two distinct elements to the open classroom model. One is the venue and the other is the approach. While it seems from people's past experiences that the venue made it difficult to focus because of the distractions, etc., the approach may still have a lot of potential if we adjust for a more appropriate venue. In my opinion there is nothing wrong with a "classroom" but if we must then let's call it something else (i.e. labs, thinking rooms, exploration labs, etc.). What I enjoyed about reading this review of the open classroom was the approach, the philosophy, the beliefs, the culture, the development, and the attitudes that the open classroom encouraged and fostered.
Perhaps with the right venue and a name change to the "Open School" – open as in thinking, learning, exploring openly – we can find a solution that yields a lot more success.
Just my two cents. Thanks!
[…] Larry Cuban on the Open Classroom / Schools (a good and balanced perspective) […]
As a parent becoming involved with an Open Classroom program for the first time, I can't say that this article truly describes what most OC programs look like today. The one here in Ventura, CA, is amazing. It's a dedicated wing at a traditional elementary school with their own garden and play area. Each class is two grades per teacher, but the teacher is barely EVER teaching the entire class at once. Instead, the class is separated into groups and at the head of each one is a parent volunteer leading whatever project is at hand. Then everyone switches. Not only are the parents completely involved in their child's education, the children are not forced to sit in chairs all day and pretend to pay attention to a teacher that is not interested in engagement, but just keeping unruly children under control. I've noticed from my own observation that the OC kids were actually able to control themselves with very little guidance, versus a traditional classroom where the teacher is at their wits end from telling kids to stop talking. I wish they'd had this type of a program for me when I was in grade school.
My school is an open classroom. I think that the teachers have a hard job of planning all of the centers, organizing the materials so that they make sense and are orderly, and planning the learning goals for the centers on a daily basis. As a teacher at this school, I work all day long until I go to bed and there is still not enough time to do this approach, although I think it is far superior to teaching young children in one, big group out of a book with a teacher at the board. That model is a terrible one. I think some combination is a good idea and a lot of teacher training. Most teachers teach the way they were taught unless they are extremely mindful about what they are doing.
I am a product of the OC experiment. For first grade, I was the first class in a brand new, no walls, elementary school in the early 1970s in Spring, TX. I remember grades 1-5 as being chaotic hot mess. I would get bored with what we were trying to learn in our group and either listen to the other groups, teachers in another group or just day dream the day away. I or my parents didn't know I was falling behind because their weren't any tests that measured my knowledge of subject matter. When I got into middle school, I was lacking a solid grasp of foundation subjects like Math, English, Science and History. Oh, I had plenty of experience in Art, social skills and day dreaming. I had to rebuild all of my foundation in essential subjects, some of which I struggled with even to this day. After I barely graduated high school, I went into the military where I was taught one thing that all my other OC schools and teachers failed to teach, and that was HOW TO LEARN. After my military service, I went to university and actually did quite well. I still wish I had a stronger grasp of the fundamentals, but that is something that has to be TAUGHT to kids at an early age. Now, that I have kids of my own, I see how they are in a much more structured environment and learn within knowledge stations in their classroom. They are tested and graded on the subjects which they have had to study, so they and I know how they are doing. Their grade school is not necessarily traditional, yet it is not the chaotic OC environment either. Their teacher actually teaches and leads them to discovery, not just leaving it up to the child to find out on their own or within a group. After all you don't know what you don't know, so how is a group of kids who don't know, supposed to automatically gleen knowledge from each other? Being a product of OC, I can honestly tell you it IS a failed experiment. The US should never go back to that method as I can attest it is a waste of learning potential. In my opinion, the best learning environment for youngsters is a safe, distraction free environment where they are lead by a teacher to self discovery and knowledge through practical methods. Parents, don't listen to the progressive, i.e. socialists, the OC method is a disorganized mess and leaves your children lacking in the fundamentals. Having come from that environment I know what I am talking about. If my kids school had been a pure OC, like I was in, I would have removed them immediately.
The end of the article sums it up, a hybrid is where most successful attempts at an open classroom land. As with any approach teachers must practice the "art" of education by knowing 1) their students and 2) their curriculum. Good teachers do step out of their comfort zones to do what is best for their students. When coupled with the collaborative approaches that are espoused today (thinking; PLCs at Work – Rick DuFour & company, aspects of Charlotte Danielson's Teacher Framework, PLB – The Buck Institute, etc. – the list is long) an open concept makes sense.
Good teaching is hard work. And, most of a good teacher's work takes place outside of the school day. Putting in hours of preparation so that they are able to engage their students in an active learning environment and available to interact in a profound manner with each student in the classroom each and every day. It is the structure of American schools that makes this really difficult. At the secondary level in a traditional setting a teacher has 45-60 minutes to interact with up to 35 students. Do the math – that is less than 2 minutes per student. No wonder they default to teacher-centered activities.
Effective schools focus on student learning, not teaching. It is not a "chicken or the egg" question. Student learning must be first and foremost. When teachers focus their attention on what it will take for students to learn they step away from the way they were taught and pull from many pedagogies and blend them in exactly the way that works best for the students currently under their tutelage.
I forgot to mention – I attended an open classroom school from grades 3 – 6 in the early 1970s. It wasn't until I was given time to investigate my 5th Grade teacher's paperback reading library, in a corner of the our "team pod", that I developed a love of reading and really learned to read. Reading groups had done nothing for me – I thought they were a joke and refused to prepare for the reading circle. To this day, I am grateful to Mrs. Cindy Turse for providing me with the opportunity to learn to read in the manner that was best for me. I hope the impact I have on students is, at least, close to the impact she had on me.
I was fortunate to be raised in a community of college educators. While in school in the 70's most if not all of my classrooms were "open" and I received the finest education that I believe American public education has ever offered.
Since public school, I've toured the world in a musical groups, done numerous public service projects in diverse populations, worked for state and federal agencies, had a wonderful career in our National Parks and now teach cultural studies and environmental justice as a college professor myself. I believe that none of this would have been possible in a "formal" educational setting that would not have emphasized the opportunity for all of my peers to meet their full potential.
Now, in my own classroom, I daily lament the regimentation and standardization that stands in the way of meaningful student learning. I reminisce on a daily basis about the quality of my education that my students likely never have and never will experience. I've done what I can for my own children in their struggle with corporatized and stultifying educational system–and they have flourished in the limited freedoms that we have been able to afford them. Thank you for this article.
I have recently revisited this site and I have found the comments all very interesting. I believe there are misconceptions about the open classroom. This is an approach to teaching and learning and is in no way related to classrooms without walls. My six years in a London Infant School demonstrated a very successful integrated day concept. The classroom looked like any other classrooms but for a visitor (like my Principal) one has to see how the day begins. Each time she entered the room the children were all busy in a very friendly environment. How did this all happen? She wanted to see it all for herself.Sometimes she found me sitting in the classroom library sharing a story with two children.The children were divided into four groups by colour names, group one being the highest achievers and group four not too confident in reading or math.. The whole class met twice for the day. Circle time listened to news and a story. Sometimes a whole group was necessary for constructing a graph. This gave the children something to write about in their news. each child irrespective of a group knew that they had to write their news, do their math, do some Teacher assigned whole group activity and read to "my teacher'. When a child has completed all tasks, each child had the rest of the day to choose freely from a range of activities including, block building, painting, sand/ water, Wendy house, reading corner, science, art and crafts. The real success to this programme was my personal decision to spend at least two hours in my classroom after school each day. This ensured that task cards were placed in each child's box either for reinforcement or a new skill to be taught by the teacher in a select group. To avoid confusion, first activities were assigned to each group so the children knew where to start and what followed. The children worked deligiently to complete their tasks as they knew that they would be free to choose for the rest of the day.The entire series of Ladybird readers was read by all the children at their own speed.. Some children had advanced to Happy Venture series, while they used library books for their group or individual projects. I was happy for a break each day when the class went for music or P.E. The first group of students spent two years and on entering the Junior school, a very puzzled male teacher had to meet me to enquire what I had done to a class of children who were so independent. For the six years, I had never written a lesson plan, nor was I given a curriculum. The Nuffield Mathematics was my guide while I followed the creative ideas of the children. The Open Classroom has two goals: There is no limit set by a curriculum and each child's potential is identified and nurtured. Whatever activity the children were engaged in, once they heard two claps from me, they stopped, looked at me for an announcement which was never repeated. Not too long ago, I tried my own method of the integrated day in a Florida classroom and it was described by a Supervisor as one of the best classes in Broward County. Early childhood practice is not static, but we fail to achieve most times because we get bogged down in theories and the lecturers who train our teachers rarely ever want to teach a class for their students to observe them. Telling is always easier than showing. The Open classroom has tremendous benefits for the classroom, and more teachers should be encouraged to make adjustments to their teaching style if they are so convinced that they can reach every child.
In Canada in 1969 I was in an 'Open Learning' school for grade 4. As we were allowed to choose our own subjects and order of learning for the day, I made sure I DID NOT choose math as it was a weak subject. As a result, when I went to grade 5 at a traditional school I was missing almost an entire year of math skills. Similar to what another man mentioned in comments, there was no testing so it wasn't until the following year that my parents learned I was MISSING one year of math (grade 4 math, gone!). This resulted in a life long struggle with math that was never quite caught up despite later graduating from university. If my experience was anything to go on, this 'Open Learning' ideal was a failure for me and the subject of math. If educators ever wanted to re-visit 'Open Learning' they would need to have some structure around it and manditory testing/exams in each area to ensure students were not missing vital components of their basic learning.
[…] As Finnish educators describe their goals, the program sounds similar to the approaches that U.S. teachers adopted briefly during Dewey's lifetime — before World War II — and again four decades ago, during the years of "open classrooms." […]
I attended an Open Space elementary school through 4th grade. It had a postive effect on my learning and encouraged me to go beyond the typical lessons and learn more about many subjects. I was fortunate to have been well-prepared for school by my parents. My dad was a professor and started us early with math and vocabulary, as wellas enrolling us in Montessori school. I agree that basic subjects must be taught to a certain level. It cannot simply be free-range schooling, but a less traditional (and thereby less stressful) approach can benefit students at the ends of the (traditional) spectrum who might not do as well with the traditional rote learning that is practiced in some schools. I got to experience that from 5th to 8th grade when we moved to West Texas. I flourished there as well, but fondly remember the enthusiasm that I gained from the Open Space shool.
I agree with Jason J.
I too was a product of the Open Classroom system in the UK, and as I've commented before on Larry Cubans blog https://larrycuban.wordpress.com/2009/12/05/fad-or-tradition-the-case-of-the-open-classroom/ the experiment was a complete disaster. I wouldn't wish Open Classrooms on anyone, not even my worst enemy.
Please, please, please do NOT repeat this experiment. If you do, then you are once again consigning a generation to failure, or at the very least knocking them back years – it took me three years to get back to the level I was at before the experiment began.
Teachers need classrooms and children need structure, taking away one of those tenants creates failure. Taking both away is just madness. I'm all for flexibility and encouraging people to achieve their goals, but to do it right it needs someone who can inspire and lead. Unfortunately, there are precious few people with those abilities in the teaching profession, and that's not a criticism of teachers, these people are hard to come by in any profession.
I believe what most comments that are strongly negative lack is the understanding it was the teachers not the space that created the problem. Just about every person I know had a "bad year" at school- does that mean we should abolish the traditional classroom? It is the teachers, the leaders and their combined understanding that create a great or not so great learning environment.
My son was enrolled in an open school in Rehovot, Israel in 1980, as a kindergartener. On the positive side, the recorder-playing program discovered him as a musician, which would not have happened otherwise. On the negative, the one year he spent there was a source of constant worry to his well-being , because it was chaotic.
In the year 1973 the Catholic school that my Family attended in Salem Mass, closed.
I ended up in an Open Classroom at the Horace Mann Labratory School on the Salem State College campus for the 6th Grade School year.
It was a lot of fun going from a very rigid learning environment to the very creative and rewarding system.
My math skills suffered but some of the other aspects of the experience were nurtured and rewarded.
Today, I are an Engineer!
At college, my Major Study was Industrial Arts/Tech Ed
I was sometimes looking over my shoulder, half expecting to be sought after for in interview, from a former teacher or student teacher for a follow up interview
I was in a gifted program in the 70s that transitioned the cohort from somewhat teacher-directed learning in grades 5 and 6 to semi-open classroom in 7th grade to a fully open classroom in 8 (students designed all their assignments–but I moved and did not do 8th grade at this schools). I keep in touch with many classmates and we all agree that for highly motivated, gifted kids whose parents strongly value education (many parents were professors), it was an ideal learning environment. We had foundational skills developed as a result of traditional teaching in the lower grades–the old fashioned kindergarten, and primary semesters instead of grades to keep the focus on reading rather than birthdates and ages as qualifiers for promotion. To handle open classroom, I think students would need enormous support at home (plenty of books and outside cultural and enrichment activities). To go from totally traditional learning to an open classroom would be folly.
Noise or chaos was never an issue–we were allowed to work in a variety of spaces including empty hallways.
very useful information.
could of had a better layout.
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The NC Senate candidate whose line, "I paid for this ice cream," became a memorable TV commercial, thanked supporters during his swearing in ceremony by buying them the cool treat.
Republican Louis Pate was sworn in Friday as the NC District 5 Senator after beating out incumbent Democrat Don Davis.
The courtroom at the Greene County courthouse was full for the ceremony. Pate mentioned that his competitor called him after they learned the final results. Pate called Davis a "class act."
Towards the end of the ceremony Pate invited everyone to a reception where his grandchildren served ice cream--and of course Pate paid for that ice cream!


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I will first demonstrate the O/R impedance mismatch by implementing an object relational mapping for a simple object model, and how minor tweaks to the object model cause superlinear increase in code complexity. Then I will demonstrate how Datomic can implement the same object model without a superlinear growth in complexity.
So we want to work with some domain objects when we write our code
case class ProjectInfo(name: String,
owner: String,
created: java.util.Date)
we can make lists of them, and modify them, and store references to them, and work with them in memory however we like:
val a = ProjectInfo("Project A", "Dustin", DateTime.now)
val b = ProjectInfo("Project B", "Jason", DateTime.now)
val c = ProjectInfo("Project C", "Toni", DateTime.now)
val projects = List(a, b, c)
"Object relational mapping (ORM) specifies how sets of java objects, including references between them, are mapped to rows and columns in database tables" (EJB3 251). This must take into account inheritance, polymorphism, database schema normalization, references between objects, one-to-many (uni- and bi-directional) relations, many-to-many relations….
The ProjectInfo O/R mapping is simple:
CREATE TABLE projects (
owner VARCHAR NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
created TIMESTAMP NOT NULL
def readAllProjects(dbconn: java.sql.Connection): Try[List[ProjectInfo]] = Try {
val query = "SELECT name, owner, created FROM projects"
val mapping =
get[String]("projects.owner") ~
get[String]("projects.name") ~
get[java.util.Date]("projects.created") map {
case owner~name~created =>
ProjectInfo(name, owner, created)
SQL(query).as(mapping *)(dbconn)
lets add another simple model:
case class Skill(name: String, description: String)
CREATE TABLE skills (
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
description VARCHAR NOT NULL
def readAllSkills(dbconn: java.sql.Connection): Try[List[Skill]] = Try {
val query = "SELECT name, description FROM skills"
val mapping =
get[String]("skills.name") ~
get[String]("skills.description") map {
case owner~name =>
Skill(name, owner)
SQL(query).as(mapping *)(dbconn)
what if a Skill is nested in a Project, and a Skill may be shared across multple Projects? This doesn't have as straightforward a mapping to SQL, so we need to add foreign key IDs to our database schema, and join across the two tables:
case class Skill(name: String, description: String)
case class ProjectInfo(name: String,
owner: String,
created: java.util.Date,
skill: Skill)
CREATE TABLE skills (
id VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
description VARCHAR NOT NULL
CREATE TABLE projects (
owner VARCHAR NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
created TIMESTAMP NOT NULL,
skillId VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL
def readAllProjects(dbconn: java.sql.Connection): Try[List[ProjectInfo]] = Try {
val query =
SELECT projects.name, projects.owner, projects.created,
skills.name, skills.description
FROM projects
INNER JOIN skills ON projects.skillId = skills.id
val mapping =
get[String]("projects.name") ~
get[String]("projects.owner") ~
get[java.util.Date]("projects.created") ~
get[String]("skills.name") ~
get[String]("skills.description") map {
case owner~name~created~skillName~skillDesc =>
val skill = Skill(skillName, skillDesc)
ProjectInfo(name, owner, created, skill)
SQL(query).as(mapping *)(dbconn)
what if a Project has a collection of Skills? to do this you need IDs in your Project table, and a third "association table" (aka "intersection table") to track a list of skills for each project – projects no longer manages his own pointers to skills.
case class Skill(name: String, description: String)
case class ProjectInfo(name: String,
owner: String,
created: java.util.Date,
skills: Set[Skill])
CREATE TABLE skills (
id VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
description VARCHAR NOT NULL
CREATE TABLE projects (
id VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL,
owner VARCHAR NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR NOT NULL,
created TIMESTAMP NOT NULL
CREATE TABLE project_skills (
project_id VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL,
skill_id VARCHAR(36) NOT NULL
def readSkillsForProject(dbconn: java.sql.Connection, projectId: String): Try[Set[Skill]] = Try {
val query =
SELECT skills.name, skills.description FROM skills
INNER JOIN project_skills ON skills.id = project_skills.skill_id
INNER JOIN projects ON projects.id = project_skills.project_id
WHERE projects.id = {projectId}
val mapping =
get[String]("skills.name") ~
get[String]("skills.description") map {
case name~desc =>
Skill(name, desc)
SQL(query).on('projectId -> projectId).as(mapping *)(dbconn).toSet
def readAllProjects(dbconn: java.sql.Connection): Try[Set[ProjectInfo]] = Try {
val query = "SELECT projcets.id, projects.name, projects.owner, projects.created FROM projects"
val mapping =
get[String]("projects.id") ~
get[String]("projects.name") ~
get[String]("projects.owner") ~
get[java.util.Date]("projects.created") map {
case id~name~owner~created =>
id -> (name, owner, created)
val projects: Map[String, (String, String, java.util.Date)] = SQL(query).as(mapping *)(dbconn).toMap
projects.map { case (projectId, project) =>
lazy val skills: Set[Skill] = readSkillsForProject(dbconn, projectId).get
ProjectInfo(project._1, project._2, project._3, skills)
Note that this generates N+1 queries - one for the project, and N skill queries. This could of course be turned into one even more complicated join, but this combined query can become very large and costly to run as we add more attributes to our model:
case class ProjectInfo(name: String,
owner: String,
created: java.util.Date,
skills: Set[Skill],
as: Set[AModel],
bs: Set[BModel],
ns: Set[NModel])
So we have to choose a balance between querying everything up front, and lazily running more queries to load attributes on demand. Even in the presence of database indexes, each query has a network cost.
All of this just so we can have a nice, object-oriented programming model for our application logic.
All this complexity is introduced because SQL cannot nest tables inside of tables. An SQL table is limited to a set of primitive types; if you want to store a reference to an object in another table, we need to implement "reference" types ourselves, by introducing IDs to our models to act as pointers, then we need to write application code to dereference the pointers, all of this causing network traffic.
Document-oriented databases (like MongoDB) do support nesting objects, but MongoDB does not maintain ACID properties. For example, we can't have an atomic transaction when we write to multiple objects.
(TODO - i've blogged it a little bit in the past, or watch one of Rich Hickey's keynotes)
Datomic solves this by embracing immutability. Datomic is an immutable database. To understand this, lets compare to git, which is an immutable datastore. I'm going to go into much more detail (loading data, instead of assuming it's there) because it helps explain what is going on.
here is the schema for the exact same object model as the last SQL example – where a ProjectInfo has a Set of Skills.
build-schema comes from a datomic utility library Datomico, which keeps things nice and readable for the demo.
Note how the schema exactly reflects the object model. No explicit IDs, no third table to store collection relations.
(def Skill (build-schema :Skill [[:name :string :unique] ; name is a string with unique constraint
[:description :string]]))
(def ProjectInfo (build-schema :ProjectInfo [[:name :string :unique]
[:owner :string]
[:created :instant]
[:skills :ref :many]])) ; skills is a Set of References
lets add some Skill 'entities' (Datomic parlance for a record).
(def skill-list [{:Skill/name "Clojure"
:Skill/description "omg parens"}
{:Skill/name "Datomic"
:Skill/description "i got 99 proiblems but state ain't one"}
{:Skill/name "Scala"
:Skill/description "what is this OO malarky (just kidding)"}
{:Skill/name "Java"
:Skill/description "every empire eventually falls"}
{:Skill/name "Postgresql"
:Skill/description "sometimes it's cool to be old"}])
(def txresult @(d/transact dbconn (data-with-dbid skill-list)))
txresult contains references to the "before" and "after" value of the database (in git terms, that's the commit we just made, and the parent commit). We can use this new database value to query the entity we just added
;; (def dbval (:db-before txresult)) ;if we did this, following queries return no results
(def dbval (:db-after txresult))
(defn qe
"helper function for queries returning exactly one entity"
[query dbval & args]
(let [res (apply d/q query dbval args)]
(d/entity dbval (ffirst res))))
(defn read-skill-by-name [dbval skill-name]
(qe '[:find ?e
:in $ ?name
:where [?e :Skill/name ?name]]
dbval skill-name))
(->> (read-skill-by-name dbval "Clojure") ;=> {:db/id 17592186045418}
(d/touch)) ;=> {:Skill/name "Clojure",
; :Skill/description "omg parens",
; :db/id 17592186045418}
We can use the queried entity references in new ProjectInfo entities. This is a departure from postgresql - the ProjectInfo entities can direcly contain references to other entities. In SQL, we need to store pointers to other records; this is first class in Datomic.
(def dbval (:db-after txresult))
(let [clojure (:db/id (read-skill-by-name dbval "Clojure"))
scala (:db/id (read-skill-by-name dbval "Scala"))
datomic (:db/id (read-skill-by-name dbval "Datomic"))
java (:db/id (read-skill-by-name dbval "Java"))
postgresql (:db/id (read-skill-by-name dbval "Postgresql"))
artscentre {:ProjectInfo/name "Artscentre"
:ProjectInfo/owner "Dustin"
:ProjectInfo/created (java.util.Date.)
:ProjectInfo/skills [clojure scala datomic]}
tinyurl {:ProjectInfo/name "Tinyurl"
:ProjectInfo/owner "Kevin"
:ProjectInfo/created (java.util.Date.)
:ProjectInfo/skills [java postgresql]}]
(def txresult @(d/transact dbconn (data-with-dbid [artscentre tinyurl]))))
and then we can inspect the values
(def dbval (:db-after txresult))
(->> (read-all-projects dbval) ; set of all projects
(first) ; get the first ProjectInfo (lazy attrs)
(d/touch) ; resolve all the projectinfo's attrs
(:ProjectInfo/skills) ; get this ProjectInfo's skills (lazy)
(mapv d/touch)) ; resolve all the skills
;=> [{:Skill/name "Scala", :Skill/description "what is this OO malarky (just kidding)", :db/id 17592186045420}
{:Skill/name "Datomic", :Skill/description "i got 99 proiblems but state ain't one", :db/id 17592186045419}
{:Skill/name "Clojure", :Skill/description "omg parens", :db/id 17592186045418}]
TLDR: Datomic lets you keep the schema as intuitive as your object model, while preserving all the usual acid properties.
Here is the complete runnable code for use in a repl.
(Which is the whole point - Datomic is the first database that lets you store nested objects, with ACID, with high performance)
It's because of immutability. All prior databases are based on mutable data structures. From the Datomic docs:
Peers read facts from the Storage Service. The facts the Storage Service returns never change, so Peers do extensive caching. Each Peer's cache represents a partial copy of all the facts in the database. The Peer cache implements a least-recently used policy for discarding data, making it possible to work with databases that won't fit entirely in memory. Once a Peer's working set is cached, there is little or no network traffic for reads.
Peers write new facts by asking the Transactor to add them to the Storage Service. The Transactor processes these requests using ACID transactions, ensuring they succeed or fail atomically and do not interfere with one another. The Transactor notifies all Peers about new facts so that they can add them to their caches.
The git analogy holds well – imagine you are running
git fetch in a tight loop in the background, so you always know the about the latest commits. I asked Stuart Sierra in person how long it takes for a Peer to become aware of another Peer's writes, and he says if your Peers are in the same datacenter as the Transactor it happens in single digit milleseconds. So your reads are always consistent, they may be a few milleseconds stale.
I may blog about this in the future if enough people tweet at me.


text:
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text:
Rank and organization: Seaman, U.S. Navy. Born: 1838, Rhode Island.
Accredited to: Rhode Island. G.O. No.: 45, 31 December 1864
Citation: Served
as seaman on board the U.S.S. Kearsarge when she destroyed the Alabama
off Cherbourg, France, 19 June 1864. Acting as the first loader of the
No. 2 gun during this bitter engagement, Read exhibited marked coolness
and good conduct and was highly recommended for his gallantry under fire
by his divisional officer.
This data was extracted from the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, U.S. Senate, Medal of Honor Recipients: 1863-1973 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1973)


text:
Interim head coach Mark Hutson addressed the media during Tulane's weekly football press conference at the James W. Wilson, Jr. Center.
Oct. 25, 2011
Video Of Tuesday's Press Conference
Mark Hutson
Tulane University Interim Head Coach
On moving Doug Lichtenberger to co-offensive line coach
"With the change and having offensive line and head coaching duties, I knew I would be pulled apart sometimes from that group. Coach (Doug) Lichtenberger has been an offensive line coach for four years. He was at UC Davis and at Ohio as an offensive line coach. On Saturday's during the game, my comfort zone was to go over and draw up plays with the offensive linemen. That's been kind of left there, obviously, and he did a great job on Saturday. He handled the adjustments there and worked well with the group. I had some obligations that came up where I had to meet with some people on Thursday, and he took the offensive line. He's going to continue to do that. As a title, he is co-offensive line coach and deservedly so. Should any media obligations arise or any team obligations arise, he will take his position group of tight ends and fullbacks, and he will take the offensive line like he has been doing. I have complete confidence in Doug. I've worked with him for the last four and a half years. He handled it this past week. It something he aspires to do, go back and be an offensive line coach, and certainly he has the qualities and did a great job last week.
On moving John Hendrick to assistant head coach
"He's been here a short time, but as the special teams coach, he handles every player on your team from the walk-ons to your star linebacker or your star tailback. He has to use them in the kicking game. He also coordinates the staff. I did special teams for eight years, so I know how this works. You have eight assistants, you have to coordinate them, take their time and manage them into all phases of that. Even though John has been here a brief time, I have grown to love and trust him. That goes along with the staff and that goes along with the players. He's got a great pedigree. He's been with some of the same coaches in that chain that I have: the Frank Broyles chain, Houston Nutt, Jackie Sherrill. We think a lot alike and in that regard - with the team having the most respect for him, his players having the most respect for him, and the coaches - he's going to be our assistant head coach. A situation arose last week where I was scheduled to be in two places at the same time. Obviously, I'm not able to do that as you know. Should that situation ever arise again, John is more than capable and more than willing to help the team."
On the events of last week
"As student-athletes and as coaches, it was an eventful week. Many of them haven't been through that. I was reminded when I was a graduate assistant at Arkansas for Jack Crowe. After the first game of the year, we had to go round the team up and explain to them tell them we were having a team meeting because we were having a coaching change. Joe Kines became the interim coach. But your worries and your concerns of being named interim for the staff from a players' perspective in how they'll play and how they'll show up. That was answered and a lot of credit goes to those student-athletes. Tuesday was a whirlwind day for you guys and for me, and it was for them. They had a day to sort it out. Wednesday was much better, we had a more lively practice. Thursday, we were moving forward. We were moving on. Friday was the same way. As a result, from the coaches and from the student-athletes, it was a great job on Saturday. The enthusiasm, the attitude and the effort was that of a team. I don't know how it was viewed from the outside world, but from our standpoint internally, it was exceptional. It was a busy week for President Cowen with Homecoming. We asked him if he would come and address the team. He took time out of his schedule and delivered a great message in the pregame to the team. I really want to thank him. From me, from the coaches and the players, it meant a lot. To see him come in with his (green) hair and his t-shirt and address them - it really helped. It fired them up. He's a great speaker and he delivered a strong message to them to believe and carry on. So I thank President Cowen for that."
On how things went in his first game as interim head coach
"You look at game day. You worry about that, the operations and how it goes. I thought Greg Davis, Steve Stanard, John Hendrick performed well. They came in and we didn't have 12 men on the field. We didn't have 10 men on the field, so that operation went smoothly."
On standouts in Tulane's special teams play against Memphis
"A guy that stood out for us was Derrick Strozier. He's second in the league in punt returns and had an outstanding game for us. He had a 24-yard punt return and had a big momentum swing for us. After they scored, he blocked a PAT. Those were two big plays that Derrick made for us. Robert Kelley continues to shine. We'd like to limit him to fewer kickoff return opportunities, but he is a tough competitor. I know he's young, he's a freshman, but he has a chance to break the school record for kickoff return yards."
On Tulane's special teams mistakes against Memphis
"The big thing that came up for the game - two big things in special teams - was the punt block. For the second week in a row, we had a punt blocked. In visiting with John (Hendrick) and visiting with the special teams staff, we have to address that. Once that becomes a problem there, that's what teams are going to do. As you saw Saturday, that was a big difference maker and momentum swing in the outcome of the game. We've got to correct that in a couple of ways. No. 1 is personnel changes. It happened with our up-backs. For the second week in a row, our up backs - the three men that we put back in the shield punt - weren't able to protect. Jonathan (Ginsburgh) stepped wider on that than he normally steps and the outcome was a blocked kick. No. 1 we correct Jonathan's mechanics. No. 2, we make changes in the personnel. Also in doing that, we have to make some scheme adjustments. Without going into game-plan plays, and I think you understand that, we will do some different scheme adjustments in our shield punt and working with that. Also a crucial play in the game was Cairo (Santos)'s missed 46-yard field goal. It hit the upright, and that was an opportunity in the game to take it from a two-score game to a one-score game. That changes after we missed that field goal. That changes the way Greg (Davis) calls the game so now we can't be in a clock mode where we can win it with a score at the end. We had to go to a pressure. We had to go to an attack. We had to a two-minute offense. That changes the way Steve Stanard calls the game. He has to get into it. There's more pressure. He's got to get the ball back to us. That's the way he calls that. So those were two big plays in the special teams unit."
On what Tulane does to correct the special teams mistakes
"What we have to do there is we have to be solid in there. In talking with the special teams, we say we have to not only be solid and not only be sound but be special. We have to make plays that contribute to us winning the game and not contribute to us losing the game."
On Tulane's defensive effort against Memphis
"Steve Stanard and the defensive staff, and I've shared this with them, but I thought they played an outstanding game. They've been under some fire from the previous weeks. It was 14-10 at halftime and they had given up two big plays. They gave up the screen pass and they gave up a wheel route. They held Memphis to less than 10 yard rushing, so it was a great first half. They came out in the second half and there was 12 points that they weren't truly responsible for without their team allowing a first down. They allowed one big play in the second half, and it was the reverse. On all of those plays, it was a back-end problem. It was a problem with the outside linebacker. We corrected that on Sunday. We went through those plays on Sunday and we will continue to work on those type of plays that hurt us in the game on Saturday to make sure that we learn from those mistakes and move forward from that. In the second half, I thought the defense really came up big. It was fourth down on our end of the field and we didn't get it. In previous games and previous seasons, that would have been the end of it. The defense would have gone out there and Memphis would have went down and scored. But they didn't do that. They went three downs and out, and we got the ball back with an opportunity to go. Another big player in the game was Ryan Travis. He leads our league in interceptions and he made a big play on the goal line to stop another scoring opportunity and allow us to gain a possession and not allow Memphis for a field goal or something there to expand the lead. Overall defensively, we just had the one turnover. We have to do more to create the turnovers. We have to do more to give the offense field position and to give them a chance to score there. Steve addressed that on Sunday. We have to play better in the red zone. We keep talking about the red zone. We're going to devote today's practice and some of Wednesday's practice to the red zone on both sides of the football in trying to address that issue."
On who stood out defensively against Memphis
"Another solid game, and he does it week in and week out, is Trent Mackey. He's fifth in the nation in tackles per game. He's obviously a defensive leader for us. He's fighting through some nagging injuries, but it hasn't slowed him down. His performance on Saturdays has been exceptional and we need him down the stretch run. Dezman Moses on d-line has played extremely well. He didn't get the fumble after the review, but he pressured the quarterback all day and he made plays. I mentioned Derrick Strozier on special teams, but he had an outstanding game from the safety position. We moved him in positions there, and he contributed. He had an impact in the game. We lost a corner. We lost Alex Lauricella. What we're going to do now is move Ryan Travis back to his corner position. That's where he played before, that's where he'll return back to and that's where he'll practice this week."
On Tulane's offensive performance against Memphis
"There are some crucial things in a game, some components, that we must do. We turned the ball over too many times. They had three takeaways - two interceptions and a fumble. In the first half, we didn't run the ball extremely well. We didn't take some of the pressure off of Ryan Griffin. We wound up with 16 carries for 50 yards in the first half. Orleans (Darkwa) wound up 4.5 a carry there, so he did do well when he was given those opportunities. Offensively, the key play if you look at the game there, was obviously the interception. We came out in the second half and scored on that drive. We had another opportunity in the red zone, which I have addressed, to score there. What happened on the play was Grif didn't see the DB - the corner in the area there. As a veteran quarterback, that ball needs to be thrown away. He knows that and he probably told you in the press conference. Either that or he takes the sack. Our tailback in the protection scheme on that scheme needs to come over. He needs to chip, if you will, that linebacker. Those things didn't happen. That comes with coaching. Players play and the coaches have to coach that. Just like the defense and special teams' mistakes in the game, that was addressed Sunday. We went over that Sunday. It was the first thing we did."
On Tulane's offensive production in the second half against Memphis
"I thought the offensive staff and Greg Davis did a great job with second-half adjustments. Obviously, the inside runs weren't being as productive as they needed to be so we went to more perimeter runs, we went to more draws and we went to more screens and we were able to have success there in the second half with those type of plays. There were no sacks in the game. The offensive line needs to do a better job with the tackle-to-tackle runs. We'll have an emphasis this week in middle drill on working those runs we feel will be successful against East Carolina. We must improve in that area and get to where that happens - zero sacks and few pressures in the game. Overall, in reviewing the film, Ryan Griffin had more time than we thought before going into the game. I mentioned the fumble, and that was crucial play in the game. The interception obviously was a momentum change, but we were in the red zone. We just had an eight-play, 73-yard drive to get us down there and the ball was stripped from Xavier Rush. We've got to be able to put that away. What would the outcome have been? I don't know. We would have loved to have the opportunity to score and go for two. We were down 16 points. Obviously, we would need an onside kick, we would need another score and we would need another two-point possession. That opportunity wasn't presented. Turnovers is something we will continue to work on. We'll work hard in the blaster with all skill guys and we'll do turnover circuits."
On who stood out offensively against Memphis
"Orleans had an outstanding game for us. He averaged 4.7 yards per carry really made some tough yards and some tough plays. I mentioned Harris Howard. Harris had an ankle injury a couple of weeks ago. For an offensive lineman with an ankle injury, you just put more tape on it. He battled through it and worked hard. He had an outstanding game for us. Another receiver who is starting to show up is Wilson Van Hooser. He made some plays for us there, and we'll need some plays down the stretch run."
Overall thoughts on the Memphis game
"There are seven or eight play in a game that will make a difference. You roughly run 75-80 plays of offense and defense and 30-35 plays in the kicking game. Somewhere in there, there are seven or eight plays that are going to make a difference. Some people would say there are three or four. This game was no different. For us to move forward and for us to be successful this weekend at East Carolina, we have to flip that and we have to be the one in those three or four plays or those seven or eight plays for that to make a difference."
On this weekend's opponent, the East Carolina Pirates
"You have the stats and you have the press release. They have a 1-2 home record and have been on the road the last three weeks. They're 3-4 overall, 2-1 in the East and tied for first place. Obviously, this game means a lot to them and it's a chance for them to come home. Offensively, they're a spread team. They spread the ball out and they have talented wide receivers. I had a chance to watch their offensive line last week when we were looking at Memphis, and they're a solid unit. They're a tough unit. They're aggressive and they get after you. The guy that makes it go for them is the quarterback, Dominique Davis. He broke the NCAA record with 36 straight completions and was 40-of-45 (against Navy). He had an unbelievable game. He is a difference maker for them and is somebody that we have to contain or at least limit his big plays that he made last week against Navy. Their wide receiver, Lance Lewis, was all-conference. He can do things after the catch. He's an outstanding athlete and he was an all-conference punt returner so John and the special teams units will have to contend in working with him. Defensively, they employ a 3-4 scheme. It's a pro defensive attack. They're very multiple in that. There'll be three down linemen and there'll be four down linemen. This week will be a little difference than the Memphis week. There will be a lot of concerns in protection. There will be a lot of concerns in the running game. There will be checks for Ryan, so it'll be great to have him back for the entire week so that we can start that process today with him. Defensively, they are led by linebacker Jeremy Grove. He's the leading tackler for them with 76 tackles. Their DB Emanuel Davis was first team, he makes plays for them and is an exceptional player. It will be a challenge on offense, defense and special teams, but that's what lies ahead. Also, former Tulane coach Duane Price is in his second year there as the outside linebacker coach, so it'll be a good opportunity to say hello to Duane before the game."
On how the team moves forward now after all the turmoil of a week ago
"It was a disappointment with the loss. A total disappointment there. But for our student-athletes and our coaching staff to respond the way they responded in that type of week was a great credit to them as good people and good players in this University. What do we have to do? We have to stay together and we have to stay focused. One game believing doesn't always measure up to success. It's a challenge. It won't happen in one week or a half a week or however many days we had to work with that. We must continue to believe in ourselves. The staff believes in the players. The players believe in the staff. We just need to keep pressing forward. We have to create the best game plan that we possibly can. The players have to believe in that game plan, be excited, be enthusiastic and be consistent from one week to the next."
On Tulane's game captains for the trip to East Carolina
"Team captains for this week are based on their performance from the game Saturday. Derrick Strozier will be a team captain and Harris Howard will be a team captain for us."
On Derrick Strozier's move to safety and his performance against Memphis
"It gave both the DB position and the defense a real lift. Earlier in the week, I told Ryan Travis that `I think pound-for-pound, you're the toughest guy on this team.' Well, Derrick must have overheard me because in Sunday's meeting I had to go back on that story and say, `You know Ryan, Derrick is giving you a run for money. I'm not sure if Derrick's not the one who is pound-for-pound the toughest player on this team.' He moved back to the safety position and he really brought a lot to the game. He helped us and I think he'll help us down the five-game stretch."
On the decision to move Strozier to safety over some others at the position
"As coaches, we know that the way to motivate players and the way to move them is the word `next.' If you know that you're not performing as a player and you know there is a next, then that creates competition and that creates fire. Coach (Jason) Rollins and Coach (Steve) Stanard did a great job of creating competition back there in the secondary."
On if Strozier's move was based on the lack of depth at the position
"Yes - with the injuries we've had at the safety position and the overall injuries in the defensive backfield. Then losing Alex (Lauricella) is a tough loss. We'll have to close ranks and move on with that. That's something that Steve and the defensive staff had to discuss and they were able to make moves. Alex goes down in a game and they are able to shift some key players around and make some moves there."
On Tulane throwing so much against Memphis and if that is a sign of things to come
"I think we ran the ball 24 times and we threw the ball 50 times. In some of those passes, I know three or four of them were checks. We had runs called and we had to check to a pass due to the front and due to the coverage. Also the game dictated to where we had to throw the ball more. We were behind by two scores in the fourth quarter. We sprinkled a few draws in there, but we knew we had to throw. The 24-to-50 ratio is high. We'd love to be balanced, but again it's not going to be 50-50 every week. The game situation will dictate that. What the defense is allowing us every week will dictate what that ratio is."
On if running the ball is paramount this weekend facing a quarterback like Davis
"Certainly there is, and as I said earlier, we need to take some pressure off of Ryan. As an offense, we need to run the ball and be more productive there. If we can keep it out of their quarterback's hands and in our hands, then we will have some success Saturday."
On how he plans on shifting those four or five game-changing plays in Tulane's favor
"You go out, you address the issue with the team, you show them the video, you make personnel changes and you make scheme adjustments. That's how you do that. Saturday night after I got home, I was watching TV and I'm seeing a reoccurring theme from some teams. Whether they have a history of it or not, that's something that happens on game day. We've addressed it. We've addressed it in the past. It has been an issue in the past, and until we take ownership as coaches and players, that may continue again. But we addressed it Sunday. We're addressing it today. We'll address on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, and we'll follow through on Saturday. Like I said, in some of those areas we've made personnel changes. In some of those areas, we'll make scheme changes."
On the team being able to not only respond to correcting mistakes but to come away with a win
"The difference is, just like it is with any team, it's confidence. It's a belief. It's an attitude. With the rough week that we had last week, this team had that attitude. They had that confidence. They did believe. Some of those negative situations that may have turned in the past, they held tight. They wanted to `link up', they called it, before the game. They came up to me and they asked, `Coach, can we link up before the game to show our togetherness, to show them that we are a chain, to show them that we are a bonded team?' I said, `Certainly, we'll link up.' Emmanuel Aluko asked, `Coach, can I bring a sledge hammer out.' I said, `Well, Manny, what are you bringing the sledge hammer for?' He said, `I want to bring the pain and that symbolizes bringing the pain and working.' I said, `Certainly Manny. We can do that. We don't want to bust the concrete up there on the floor so we'll create a pad there for you to hit.' And I said, `Please don't hit anyone.' I warned Dr. Stewart before the game to No. 1 stand clear.' It's an overall attitude. It's an overall belief. At times right there, we didn't respond to that. I felt the momentum change myself. I called the team up and addressed that during the game. The only thing I could do there to pull them back was to say, `Hey, this has happened in the past. Not today. Let's respond. Let's keep working.' But like some of the things I've mentioned, like the three-and-out after our fourth, that's a positive sign. The offense taking it down the field. Yes, we turned the ball over, but they believed on the sideline that we were going to score, we were going to get the two-point play and we were going to get the onside kick. It has to begin somewhere. We're pointing toward Saturday and that's where it begins."
On Albert Williams not playing last week against Memphis
"No, Albert didn't play. He's our third-team tailback. I had a number of second-team offensive linemen that did not play. Our second-team quarterback did not play. A number of second-teamers didn't play. We're not intramurals. We're going to play our best athletes. Will we need Albert down the road? We certainly will. We'll need him. Will there be schemes and game plans where he has a role in that? Yes, there will be."
On the importance of winning to establish a different mindset on the way he is doing things now
"That's a great question. We're judged on wins. We're judged on the losses that we have here. In the outcome, that's what will be judged by me and the staff that we have. I think, more important than the wins and the losses, is the attitude of the team. It's the belief in one another. It's being competitive throughout the game. It's when things go wrong like they did on Saturday, which they will in a game - it's ups and downs, it's like a rollercoaster in a game - that they pull together offensively, defensively, on special teams and as a staff. Is it crucial that we win a game? Obviously it's crucial that we win a game. But to me, you've got to take small steps. You've got to do building blocks, if you will. Even though it's been mentioned and it will be said again how disappointing the loss was on Saturday, I think when we look at our previous mistakes we learn from them and not dwell on them. If we dwell on them, it clouds future success. It clouds an opportunity for us to have future success. We're going to learn. We're going to correct those mistakes. Just like in the past, we're not going to dwell on those mistakes. We're going to go forward so we can have future success."
On the proposed changes to the punt shield
"Well, you'll see it today at practice, but Casey Blum will move into the place of Matt Marfisi. We'll try a couple of people at that position, put them on video and critique them. There may be some other changes, and not just today."
On Tulane having so many blocked punts in recent years
"We give a scheme and we give an execution. Their players are on scholarship, too, and they come up with schemes on how to break that down. It is frustrating more so than bewilderment. That's a question and a concern, and it is in our offices and it is for the team. I was a special teams coordinator for eight years. You can play well in every phase of special teams. Have one break-down, and the day is gone. You've lost in all six phases. But as I mentioned earlier, we'll make personnel changes. We'll show video. We'll make scheme changes. Not wholesale scheme changes but we'll make scheme changes to see that that problem does not arise again."
On how he plans to keep the team positive when they are trailing or fall behind late in a game
"Obviously, you try and address that in fall camp with team building to where times are rough and in times of crisis, you're just not going to turn loose of the rope. You hope that carries through during the season. And if you do have those situations, you rally the troops as assistants, as the interim head coach and you pull them together. Our leaders on the team - our Trent Mackey, our Dezman Moses, our Ryan Griffin - they have a voice, too. They have to say, `Come on guys,' and be the leaders. Mistakes are going to happen and breaks are going to happen in a game. We're going to stay positive and we're going to overcome those. That's the way I see it happening."
On to what he can attribute to Wilson Van Hooser's break-out game against Memphis
"Confidence. He's gained confidence each week. He has all season, from the opening bubble screen against (Southeastern Louisiana) that he took for a touchdown. He caught a bubble screen out here last week and I told him, `You know, Wilson, you are allowed to do that again anytime you want to, starting Saturday against Memphis.' But he's confident in himself."


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surveying secondhand foldies online, using keyword brompton
craigslist canada (default) 0
craigslist Taiwan (default) 0
- craigslist, Canada (vancouver)
WANTED "folding bike... dahon, giant or Brompton.... 2 bikes for $400." Obviously even more unrealistic than I am. Bloody Canadian cheapsakes!
craigslist, japan (tokyo) 0
craigslist, philippines 0
craigslist, USA, seattle
several, e.g.
- FOR SALE "Brompton SR6 - $1500" And that's with 200 km on it!
- WANTED "Brompton folding bikes - $850.Will pay cash" Wow...
craigslist, USA (New York)
- FOR SALE "Brompton folding basket ... Retails $88, asking $70, no negotiating." I'd say that's a high. price for something used. And he 's not. 'asking' if there's no wiggle room in price
- FOR SALE brand- new 6-gear w/ rear rack, fenders, bag mount, "P" handlebars. Paid 1700, asking. $1200
- WANTED. Won't pay near retail
craigslist , USA, Orange County
- FOR SALE S2L 4-year old with flat tire $1240
- FOR SALE 6-speed M damaged rear fender , needs tuneup, $800. Another dame needing rear tensioner. $725
craigslist, USA, Oklahoma City 0
craigslist, USA, SF Bay
WANTED, no details except has to be a Brompton and S type best
- Chicago 0
- Cinncinati 0
- cleveland 0
- columbus 0
- dallas 0
- denver 0
- detroit 0
- fresno 0
OK, you get the idea. Question is is it really such a seller's market or are Bromptons being sold on consigment in bike shops or a different online marketplace?
Didn't note details but some Mezzos, Terns and a Bike Friday, seen.


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Latest Headlines
Cooler than average temperatures this week.
A company said it has faced challenges since seeking approval to put a care ...
The No. 24 Arkansas baseball team (21-13) raced out to an early lead Wednesday ...
Due to the threat of inclement weather, Arkansas baseball's series opener with ...
LONOKE, Ark. (KTHV) -- The Lonoke County Sheriff's Office says a detention officer has been fired and criminal charges have been filed against the officer.
William Alery was fired Aug. 31. His firing and charges stem from an internal affairs investigation after a complaint was reported.
Officials say the officer violated a policy which includes furnishing, possessing, or using prohibited articles, a class C felony.
Sheriff Jim Roberson says violations of policies and misconduct will not be condoned or allowed within the Sheriff's Office.
An investigation continues.
(Source: Lonoke County Sheriff's Office)


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About Us:NYC ANTIFA is an autonomous blog that is trying through different media (news, videos and information in general) help to build, defend, educate and create an effective cultural resistance against fascism.
Updates (///)
- .@_NeverGrow @EmergenProtocol NIE claims you were contacted Friday. do you have a copy of the email you can share? 1 hour ago
- @_NeverGrow @EmergenProtocol thank you. 2 hours ago
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WHAT: Best antifascist, diy and political bands playing since the 80's
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Tag Archives: documentary
Aug. 8th 2012 – Brooklyn Premier of Roadmap to Apartheid
Wednesday, August 8, 2012 – 7:30pm St. Francis College – Founders Hall Theater 180 Remsen St New York, NY 11201 RSVP: facebook.com/events/242738609180242 Roadmap to Apartheid is coming to Brooklyn, at a festival to celebrate all things made by or about Brooklynites. … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Events, New York City Tagged Ana Nogueira, documentary, Eron Davidson, film, israel, movie, palestine, Roadmap to Apartheid
June 21st 2012 /// Squat Cinema, two documentaries from the european squatter movement
Posted in Events, New York City, United States Tagged 69, documentary, film, interference archive, resistance, resistir es vencer, solidairty, squat, squat cinema, squatters
NYC: ANARCHISM ON FILM / December 16 – December 23
At the Anthology Film Archives 32 2nd Ave New York, NY 10003 (212) 505-5181 Although an entity called 'anarchist cinema' is almost impossible to define, anarchists with an interest in film have long been preoccupied with two interrelated strands: historical films … Continue reading
Posted in Call To Action, Events, New York City, United States, Video Tagged Alain Tanner, ANARCHISM ON FILM, Anthology Film Archives, BASTARDS OF UTOPIA, BORN IN FLAMES, CHARLES, DEAD OR ALIVE, documentary, EL SOPAR / ZERO FOR CONDUCT, film, Giuliano Montaldo, Gordon Carr, JOURNEYS FROM BERLIN, LA COMMUNE, LIVING ON YOUR FEET: THE STRUGGLES OF CIPRIANO MERA, Lizzie Borden, Maple Razsa, movies, Pacho Velez, PACIFIC STREET FILMS EVENING, Peter Watkins, SACCO & VANZETTI, THE ANGRY BRIGADE, THE OLD SCHOOL OF CAPITALISM, Valentí Figueres Jorge, Yvonne Rainer, Želimir Žilnik
"Who Bombed Judi Bari?" sneak preview to air at NYC Anarchist Forum
by WW4 Report The Libertarian Book Club,* New York City's oldest continuously active anarchist institution (founded 1946), kicks off the fall season of its Anarchist Forum series as legendary Northern California songster and activist Darryl Cherney returns to his native … Continue reading
Posted in Events, New York City Tagged anarchist forum, anarchists, darryl cherney, documentary, libertarian book club, mary liz thomson, new york city, nyc, occupy wall street, ows, the brecht forum
Russia: Antifascist Attitude
"Anti-Fascist Attitude" is the first ever documentary on the emerging Russian anti-fascist movement which is made by the activists themselves. The movie features both moderate NGO activists and radical grassroots activists and anarchists from three cities – Moscow, St. Petersburg and Irkutsk. It … Continue reading
Posted in Russia Tagged antifa, antifascism, documentary, russia


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Index of Memorial Resolutions and Biographical Sketches
Carroll Day Simmons, professor of business statistics, died on April 11, 1989. He was 92.
Professor Simmons was born on September 30, 1896, in Liberty Hill, Texas. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees from The University of Texas at Austin in 1924. He became a CPA in 1929.
Professor Simmons joined the faculty of the University in 1927. He served as secretary to the Board of Regents from 1925 to 1929. He was the UT Austin comptroller from 1940 to 1947 and vice president and comptroller from 1947 to 1950. He was named vice chancellor for business and finance in 1950. He resigned his position with the University in 1953 to assume the post as vice president and senior trust officer for the First City National Bank in Houston. He retired from that position in 1964.
Professor Simmons served as president of the Central Association of College and University Business Officers in 1946-47. He was also secretary of the M. D. Anderson Foundation from 1953 to 1964.
In 1967 Professor Simmons was named an outstanding alumnus of the College of Business Administration. In 1980 he was appointed an honorary member of the UT Austin Centennial Commission. In 1982 the UT System Board of Regents established the Carroll D. Simmons Centennial Teaching Fellowship in Engineering.
John R. Durbin, Secretary
The General Faculty
Biographical sketch prepared by Teresa Palomo Acosta and posted on the Faculty Council web site on December 21, 2000. Additional biographical sources can be found in the UT Office of Public Affairs.


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Exact results for degree growth of lattice equations and their signature over finite fields
Seminar Room 1, Newton Institute
AbstractIn the first part of the talk, we study the growth of degrees (algebraic entropy) of certain multi-affine quad-rule lattice equations with corner boundary conditions. We work projectively with a free parameter in the boundary values, so that at each vertex, there are 2 polynomials in this parameter. We show the ambient growth of their degree is known exactly, via the asymptotics of the Delannoy double sequence. Then we give a conjectured growth for the degrees of the greatest common divisor that is cancelled at each vertex. Taken together, these provide us with a constant coefficient linear partial difference equation that determines the growth in the reduced degrees at each vertex. For a whole class of equations, including most of the ABS list, this proves polynomial growth of degree. For other equations where the cancellation at each vertex is not high enough, we prove exponential growth. In the second part of the talk, we study integrable lattice equations and their perturbations over finite fields. We discuss some tests that can distinguish between integrable equations and their non-integrable perturbations, and their limitations. Some integrable candidates found using these tests can then be shown to have vanishing entropy via the results of the first part of the talk. Both parts of the talk are joint work with Dinh Tran (UNSW).
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Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Studies (LGBT)College of Arts and Humanities
2101 Woods Hall, 301-405-6877
The Department of Women's Studies offers an interdisciplinary undergraduate certificate and a minor in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies (LGBT). These are designed to examine the lives, experiences, identities and representations of LGBT persons, those who are today described as having a minority sexual orientation or who are gender transgressive.
For more information, see Minors or Certificate Programs in Departments, Majors, Programs.


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VIDEO: OSU offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich mic'd up in practice
The legend of Oklahoma State offensive coordinators, at least in recent years, goes far beyond numbers.
The past two may have received lucrative promotions because of what their explosive Cowboy offenses did on the field. But Dana Holgorsen and Todd Monken became recognizable nation-wide college football names, in part, because of their eccentric off-the-field personalities.
Holgorsen chugged red bull, lived out of a hotel, had a driver and created a mysterious persona that's followed him to West Virginia. Todd Monken replaced him, cussed a little bit on ESPN, was extremely candid with the media and immediately won over the fan base.
So, when Mike Gundy was looking for the next successor to his air raid attack, many assumed 'unpredictable and energetic personality' was a requirement on the résumé.
Here's one of your first looks at Mike Yurcich, the guy Gundy eventually hired, in action. The Oklahoma State athletic department mic'd him up during a Spring practice and released this video on YouTube in late April.
Doesn't appear to be quite as fiery as the last two (who is?), but seems to have that youthful energy that this offense seems to thrive off.


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A lot was riding on 'Bridesmaids.' It was reported that many studios were waiting to green-light any female-fronted films until the key first-weekend box office returns for the film were tabulated, a rumor Apatow confirmed in an interview with The New York Times.
"Sadly, I think some of that talk was true," Apatow told the Times. "There are a lot of female-driven comedies on the bubble at the studios, and they do look to measure how well these things do and what levels of interest there are in certain genres."
Apatow continued, "One of the reasons there was pressure is because the studios knew this movie came out very well, and if nobody bothered to go see it, they could say, 'Even when you make a really good one, nobody comes.' But because people came, the opposite lesson was learned, which is, there's an enormous neglected community of moviegoers who want to see films like this."
The 'Knocked Up' director produced the Paul Feig–directed, Kristen Wiig/Annie Mumolo–scripted film for Universal. Wiig stars as a beleaguered maid of honor forced to suffer through the traditional bachelorette shenanigans in the lead-up to her best friend's (Maya Rudolph) wedding. Naturally, a variety of obstacles pop up, from a competing bridesmaid (Rose Byrne) and a jerk womanizer (Jon Hamm) to food poisoning and the character's real-life money problems, with Wiig forced to persevere to make sure her BFF's big day is the best it can be.
Check out the trailer:
Describing the sexism 'Bridesmaids' and other female-driven films face, Apatow said:
I always felt it was important to sell it to women and hope the buzz got around to men, that it's just as funny to them. It's ridiculous that women have to see 8 million male-driven films, and no one ever says, "Will women come to see these five guys hijack a plane?" They just assume they'll come because they have no other options. This conversation never happens in the reverse. There aren't people in a room right now, terrified about whether women are going to show up to 'The Hangover.' It's great that there's proof that there is a big market – and proof that men want to see this movie about women.
With 'Bridesmaids' an official success -- the film cost just over $32 million and should recoup its production budget by the end of the week -- a variety of other unconventional (i.e., non-rom-com) comedies featuring women as the central character look likely to move forward. Among them are a stoner comedy, tentatively titled 'Best Buds,' being developed by Natalie Portman's production company as a potential vehicle for the Oscar-winning actress and 'The Low Self Esteem of Lizzie Gillespie,' a long-in-the-works comedy scripted by 'The Office' writer and star Mindy Kaling.
categories Movies


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Could He Really Have Been MURD ERED? His Family Are Convinced His Death Was Foul Play. and This Week LA Police Intensified Their Criminal Investigation. Here DAVID JONES,who Has Followed the Jackson Case from the Beginning, Asks
NO ONE can doubt that Michael Jackson was surrounded by some decidedly dubious characters during the final days of his surreal and ultimately tragic life. But was any one of them sufficiently malevolent to have killed him, as has been suggested in the past few days? From the moment I boarded a Los Angeles-bound plane, just a few hours after the singer's shocking and untimely death was announced, this question has gnawed away at the back of my mind.
In those first few hours, of course, the very possibility seemed too preposterous to be voiced. After all, there were then no obvious reasons why anyone should want to harm Jackson, and there were myriad other factors that might have contributed to his death.
For one thing, Jackson was a fragile figure.
At 5ft 10in tall, he weighed just over 8 stone and was little more than skin and bone. He was also known to be chronically addicted to pain-killing drugs, and had suffered from a number of physical and mental ailments, including anxiety and clinical depression.
And for all the transparent insincerity of his fawning hangers-on, he was surely more valuable to them alive than dead. As his sister, La Toya, remarked acidly last week, he was a perpetual 'cash cow' to the grasping coterie who surrounded him.
He paid their generous salaries and inflated professional fees, and his sell-out 50-concert run at London's O2 Arena, which would have grossed more than [pounds sterling]100 million, promised even fatter rewards.
Casting the net more widely, I considered his possible enemies. He had certainly made some very bitter ones down the years -- not least among the young boys he was accused of molesting and their families.
Yet these travails seemed long behind him. By way of various out-of-court settlements, he had concluded the resulting legal wrangles and closed that benighted chapter of his life. And at 50, he appeared to be making a new start.
Ironically, in fact, at the time he died, Jackson was more popular than at any time since the late Eighties.
That much is clear from the extraordinary outpouring of grief that continues, unabated, not only in America but around the world, more than three weeks after paramedics were summoned to his rented mansion in exclusive Holmby Hills, Los Angeles.
For all this, however, my suspicion that Jackson was a victim of foul play refuses to go away. Indeed, it grows stronger the more I examine his death, and the more I learn about the people who had effectively taken control of his every waking -- and, perhaps more pertinently, sleeping -- moment.
We know now that Jackson's family harboured the same dark fears from the moment they gathered around his body, at the UCLA Medical Centre in Los Angeles.
They are so convinced that Jackson was killed that they have commissioned an independent autopsy and refuse to bury the body, leaving it in cold storage at Forest Lawn Cemetery, Los Angeles, in case further tests are required.
The wisdom of this became clear three days ago, when the Los Angeles Police Department was revealed to be staging a full-scale murder inquiry.
According to TMZ, the reliable Hollywood news website that has consistently led coverage of this story, the police have already had 'multiple conversations' with the District Attorney, who would decide whether or not to bring charges, and whom to prosecute.
For its part, the District Attorney's office has confirmed that the death is being treated as a criminal investigation by the LAPD.
So what evidence is there to suggest that Jackson was killed unlawfully, and if he was, who the possible suspects may be? In conducting their investigation, one of the LAPD's most crucial tasks will be to compile a list of all the people who played a part in the star's life, and the nature of their roles. It is a complex web. Following his humiliating trial on child molestation charges in 2005, Jackson's personal and business affairs underwent a huge upheaval. …