MOOCs and Planning my Year

I received my C++ Developer certificate in the mail yesterday, from the classes I had been taking through UAH.

I also made a video this month for YouTube, demonstrating my Lego Mindstorms bumpbot. I've received feedback that I plan to incorporate into a re-do. I'm considering a series of these videos, with Mindstorms robots, then Arduino projects, and then Raspberry Pi, as STEM outreach.

I went back to Codecademy and finished up their Python training. The discussion board listed several MOOCs that we could take to continue that work, so next I went over to Coursera and EdX. I found a number of programming and tech-related courses to sign up for and brush up on skills.

Since most of the MOOCs didn't start right away, I've moved on to Java on Codecademy. I figure if I do one segment per day of Codecademy, and one section of the MOOCs, I should be able to get the work done.

The Personal is Political

When we lived in Houston, one of the interim ministers before Rev. Dr. Matt Tittle was Rev. Shirley Ranck, who nearly 40 years ago developed the Cakes for the Queen of Heaven adult religious education for the Unitarian Universalist Association. The curriculum explores the divine feminine in history, and also women's issues in society.

I believe that is where I first learned about the Consciousness Raising groups that developed in the 1960s. What I was told was that as the women started to talk about their lives, they began to see common themes, things that many or all women experienced. And so they began to see how their personal lives connected to the bigger, political world.

Yesterday I promised I would get back to John Scalzi's post: Why Yes, I Should Write About Politics.  John writes:

Follow Friday: Personal Branding Blog

Here's another post in my Follow Friday series.  This time, I discuss the Personal Branding Blog.

Space connections

Some time ago, I mentioned how when I was growing up in Nebraska, the space program felt so far away, like I had not connections with is whatsoever.  I was in college by the time Clayton Anderson was selected as an astronaut, my understanding is that he's the first astronaut from Nebraska.


My classmates seemed to think that working for the space program was an impossible dream, "You have to be SMART to work for NASA!"  Sometimes it seemed like my parents agreed with that assessment.

(The truth is that intelligence is a big help, but superhuman Genius is not required.)

Second Chances: Cooperative Education

I had interviewed for cooperative education positions in the spring of my freshman year of college, with no luck. One of the difficulties I discussed seemed to be proving my interest in aerospace on the resume, as an electrical engineering major.

So in the fall of my Sophomore year, I made a few changes to my co-op resume.  I added the Russian language I had begun to study.

First real jobs

The summer between graduating high school and beginning college was a very strange, transitional time.  I took a job with a temp agency, doing secretarial (2) work, mostly data entry.  Mom had ensured that all of us were decent typists, we kept Typing Tutor software on the computer and were encouraged to practice with it.  But there's nothing like spending a ~40-hour workweek typing to really hone that skill.

9 reasons to join a Professional Organization

During the holiday season, I am re-posting an article from my previous blog.

Today I want to bring my blog back to STEM. Specifically, engineering professional organizations.

Why join a professional organization?