Music Monday: Music and Learning

Today's music calls for a longer introduction.

See, in Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders series, the Harpers of Pern are, among other things, the teachers of children and keepers of culture. Being harpers, they teach through music.

As a child of the '80's, I grew up with Sesame Street and Schoolhouse Rock, programs that used music as a tool to teach anything from grammar, to math, to civics and socialization. I know that there have been many catchy tunes that I would find myself singing over the course of my life, many different lyrics I've learned.  When an uncle showed me pictures from his time in Austria, I recognized Eidelweiss from the "Sound of Music" song.

Music Monday: The Golden Key

A friend shared this lovely video this week:

I think it does a wonderful job illustrating how Art interacts with Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

I Stand with Ahmed - the Economic Importance of STEM Education

• #IStandWithAhmed lesson: Curiosity is for white kids
• Includes words from Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein at MIT, whose Medium posts I have linked to in the past.
• She also made an appearance on MSNBC
• Christian Science Monitor: Why #IStandWithAhmed is about more than a Muslim boy in Texas (+video)
• Discusses the impact of the School-to-prison pipeline

I saw another article that included quotes from Dr. Lee (@dnlee5). I can't find the link to share, but I *think* I'm seeing a trend in more "ask the people most affected" reporting. If so, I think that's a good thing.

A is for Art

I discovered my passion for space history in COMM 114, the required Freshman Communications class.  In 2002, I attended a Lunch-and-Learn on Space History, which rekindled my interest in the subject.  I always learn something a little new, and the engaging speaker reminded me that there was more to unpack from that era.

Soon after the Lunch-and-Learn, I became aware of a course being offered at the nearby University of Houston - Clear Lake (UHCL), titled "International Space Politics and Technology."  The course was part of the Space & Exploration Studies concentration for UHCL's M.A. in Humanities.

Electrical Engineering

Before I move on to talk about my internship experiences, I wanted to talk a little more about what college was like my third semester.

I had finished the project that the Band had needed a work-study student to do, so I had to find a different job.  Brian had done well enough in school the last year, that he also needed to get a job. So we both started working at the cafeteria in his dorm.

Week of Space

I apologize, this was supposed to go out on 4/16, but it seems to be stuck "publishing" on my phone.

Last week was a good week for me, a lot of space events going on.  Saturday a week ago was Yuri's Night (observed) for the Huntsville area, with a huge party in the Davidson Center.  Yuri's Night officially is celebrated April 12 (4/12, get it?), in honor of the launch of Yuri Gagarin, first human in space, on April 12, 1961.  For anyone concerned about why Americans would want to celebrate that, April 12, 1981 was the date of the first Space Shuttle launch.  So it has become a World Space Party day.

First cut

The summer between my freshman and sophomore years of college, I had the recurring nightmare that I would be cut from the marching band.  I hadn't marched a show on the field my entire first season, and I wasn't sure which would be worse - knowing I wouldn't be performing all season, or failing the Challenges for every show.

I practiced playing, and tried to work on marching, but I didn't know anybody in South Bend who could help me.  I felt like I was on my own.  Brian was encouraging.  Dear Brother #1 was... not.

Supporting each other

In the last post, I wrote a little bit about our falling in love.  It's frustrating, that so many of the fairy tales and stories that we read, hear, see on television, etc..., so many stories just stop and handwave "happily ever after."  Because I know that the story continues.  That happiness may continue, but it's not a constant.  Nothing is.  Just because you've found someone, does not mean that everything else will suddenly go right.

Finding Brian was the *start*of something right.  But that didn't mean things were perfect, or that all troubles had ended.  I was only in my first semester of engineering school, at one of the top schools in the country.  I'd like to move on to the second semester for next post... but I don't want to sugar-coat college life.  I struggled with a lot of things, things that I think are not unique to me.

I was living in South Bend when the movie Rudy came out.  Everybody loves a happy ending.  But it is an unfortunate fact of life, that everyone has to choose what is most important to them.  In the things that mattered the most to me, engineering and a career that lived my dream, graduating from college was a triumphant success.

In other things that mattered to me... choosing engineering, and those academic pursuits, had a price.

Teenager in love

I was 18 when I started college.  The first week of classes, I noticed that the calculus assignments were work I had done before.  I checked the syllabus, and realized I knew 3/4ths of the material already.  So I went to the Freshman Engineering office, and asked about what I could do.

The advisers their told me that I could test out of that calculus course.  So we scheduled an exam.  I stuck with the class, took the test... and did not pass.  A different adviser gave me the results, and when I explained my concern that I would not do so well in a class where I wasn't challenged, he revealed that I had only missed passing by 5 points, about 1 question.

Programming

One of the classes I took in my first semester was C programming.  The class was held in the huge lecture hall in the Class of 1950 building.  The class looked to me to have a decent mix of guys and gals, but then we were divided into sections for our lab homework.  While I had a female Teaching Assistant, I was one of only three female students in the lab.  The rest were all guys.

Band camp, continued...

One of the evenings in band camp, possibly Tuesday, Roy Johnson (the Voice of the All-American Marching Band) spoke to the group.  He asked all the freshmen to stand up and look around the room.  After we had done so, he said that the chances were good we had just seen the person we would marry.  He also gave some good advice on time management, how to fit the 10-20 hours a week of rehearsals plus performances in with sleep, meals, studying, and classes.

Another evening, perhaps Wednesday, we started practice at the drill field and parade-marched back to Elliott Hall of Music.  Something like this, except it was evening:

This one time, at band camp

One Monday in August, a week before classes started, my dad & my sister drove me to Purdue and helped me move into my dorm room.  Because I was checking in a week early, I had to pay fees for that extra week.  Also, all members of a residence hall are enrolled in a club, which has its own mandatory dues.

Purdue has a variety of options for living on or off campus.  Things have changed considerably since I lived there, I see that most of the dorms have become "co-ed."  However, it is worth checking what Purdue means by "co-ed."  When I lived in Owen Hall, at the time it was the only co-ed H-hall, and by co-ed it meant that one wing was for women, one wing was for men, and the common areas (the bar of the "H") were shared.

Meeting my first astronaut

The very last weekend before I started college, an astronaut made an appearance at one of the malls in town.  The way I remember it, I was able to attend because it turned out I was not needed to work on Sunday.  I brought three of my brothers along.  Kawphy (almost 14), Sguth (12), and we had to bring our youngest brother (20 months).

We arrived at the mall in time.  I found where the appearance would be.  The adolescent brothers ran off, I could see them on the 2nd floor balcony while the astronaut talked.  I've heard many astronauts speak since then.  The main quote I remember was about getting into a rocket built by the lowest bidder.

They were still upstairs when I got in line with my baby brother to get autographed photos.  I'm sure it looked bad, 18-year-old girl with toddler in arms.  But we got two autographed pictures, my brother's was even personalized.

It was so short, there wasn't a lot of time to talk.  Besides having my fussy baby brother, I mumbled something about being a "space case," which probably didn't come across the way I meant it.  I met up with my other two brothers, we shopped a little, and then when nearly everyone had cleared out, the four of us went back downstairs where the astronaut was heading out.

It was... different.  I don't know what I expected.  I learned a lot.

Registering for college classes.

Purdue had a Day on Campus for incoming students to attend over the summer, before starting classes.  It seemed like most students had their parents with them, but my parents didn't come.  I wanted to bring my high school friend, but they said no to that too.  So I made the 3-hour drive each way by myself, first road trip.

Giving Arts a Chance: Senior year

We moved again, the summer between my junior and senior years.  My father's contract was not renewed, so he spent the summer looking for a new job.

I missed a lot of the job search.  My aunt & uncle in Oceanside, California were preparing to move, and needed someone to house-sit for a few weeks.  So for the price of a plane ticket, I spent the summer with them.


He found another job in South Bend.

Giving Arts a Chance: Junior year

So we moved from Nebraska back  to Indiana.  The place that is home, but not mine.  My mother's family has lived in Indiana since at least 1920.   My father's side of the family has been on the Indiana/Ohio border for about 200 years.

Mom grew up visiting her grandmother on Sundays, and playing with her cousins regularly.  I was lucky to see my grandparents once a year, and my cousins less than that.

We moved to a small town in northwestern Indiana.  Starke County, just north of Pulaski County.

I don't recall registering for classes, so I am guessing my parents registered me.  I'm not sure why I didn't take band that year.  Did I consciously choose not to?  Did they simply forget to sign me up?  Or did it have activity fees that they balked at?  It might not have fit the schedule that I had.  Regardless, I didn't take band.

Giving Arts a Chance - Sophomore Year

Continuing my series of thinking about arts in my life.  My Sophomore year of High School, I was actually enrolled in band.  We had two bands: Intermediate and Advanced.  I was in the Intermediate Band.  This was the year I learned that the only other clarinet player in the school was a Senior.  I got to know her a little better that year, as the only other clarinet player.

Then again, she was out in front of everybody a lot that year.  She was selected as Mother McAuley for the senior's Mercy Day play, she got the lead in Godspell, the Fall Musical.  The school did that with an all-girl cast, it was cool.  And she was the lead for Cinderella, the spring play.  I was so in awe of her.  We exchanged pictures towards the end of the year, she wrote a note asking me to take care of Mrs. Jensen the next year.  I wish I could have done that.

Giving Arts a Chance - Freshman year

In my last post I wrote a little about the arts offerings at my first high school, and I thought I would elaborate on the classes I mentioned, the plays my friends were in.

Being the only student from my elementary school to go to that high school, I didn't walk into school with friends.  The day that we had class retreats, one of the Freshman activities was to make friendship bracelets, and then give them to someone in the class.  I guess the teachers figured out that nobody knew me well enough to give me one, so Mrs. Wells (my Academic Advisor, who was there that day) made up a bracelet and when we did presentations, she gave it to me.

Intro to Arts was required for all the Freshmen.  The school operated on a quarter/semester system, so the class was divided into four groups, and each quarter we rotated to the next class.

Memory

One of these days, I plan to write about new beginnings, starting all over again... about globalization, family, the village and the internet.  Every time our family moved, it was both a blessing and a curse.  It was an opportunity to start over again, to try something different, be a different "me" than I had been before.  It also meant that nobody knew where I was coming from, or why something might be meaningful to me.

My first high school was Mercy High School, in Omaha, Nebraska.  An all-girls private liberal arts Catholic high school run by the Sisters of Mercy.  I was there for two years, transferring to a public school just in time for my Junior year of high school.  But today I want to talk about Mercy.

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all the best, health and happiness for the new year!

I mentioned earlier this week that Glee has been something like "The Artist's Way" for me.  Of course, it's not Glee alone.  It's also the Huntsville Feminist Chorus that I sing with, and a book from my summer reading (Horning in: The Grown-Up's Guide to Making Music for Fun), and waking up and realizing that all the things I had been stressing over for the past 4-6 years are... no longer worries.  Well, our son will always be a concern, but he's also a blessing :)

I've been reflecting a lot these past few months.  The previous time I wrote fanfiction was about twenty years ago, in partnership with a high school friend.  Thankfully, that piece of writing is NOT posted to the internet to embarrass me now.  The manuscript is safely unread on a shelf in my living room.