Small Minds in a Big World

This will be an unusual post for Murphy's Day.  But, among many things that Murphy taught me, was to be open.  She was, until the day she died, open to new experiences, smells, things in her life.

One of my strongest beliefs is that when talking about the ecological world, you have to think as expansively as possible.  While you can be a researcher looking at a small niche, where that niche fits in the Big World is important.  An atmospheric scientist by the name of Cliff Mass agreed with me on this subject.  He had a small "gig" on the local affiliate of National Public Radio, KUOW.  Every Friday, for a few minutes, he would talk about weather, a bit about climate, and every once in awhile, talk about coastal radars or how math is taught in public schools.  Every academic scientist gripes about how math illiterate undergrads are these days (and don't even get me started on writing skills).

Apparently there is some big fight between folks like Cliff Mass who believe math should be taught like math has been taught for decades and folks, particularly from the UW College of Education, who have developed a new math curriculum which encourages students to "discover" math, regardless if 2 + 2 = 4.  For some reason, KUOW told Dr. Mass (who teaches at the University of Washington) to never, ever, talk about math curriculum when he discusses weather.  And, unfortunately for us, he mentioned math skills when trying to correct some mis-information by earlier folks on the radio about college admissions (something he also knows about since he is the admissions director for his department).

So, Dr. Mass was fired.

Here is his fabulous blog: http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/

We live in a very connected world.  Simply talking about "weather" isn't sufficient in order to understand the complexities of weather, climate, natural storm events, and consequences to the ecosystems.  To muzzle Dr. Mass is simply small minded, something, unfortunately, KUOW has become.

Again, sorry for this change of pace.