As both an engineer and a parent, I get the exposure and readiness aspects. At the same time, technology changes quickly, and the fundamentals, like math, physics, chemistry and biology, along with the depth of understanding and abstract thinking developed by studying these subjects, are pretty constant. In other words, we should not confuse being a consumer of technology, with developing the skills and qualities needed to apply it in a valuable way (however you define that), or develop new technology. It’s critical to take this ever-changing and somewhat expensive technology, when you consider short life cycle and number of students, and use it to maximum advantage.

So I really enjoyed this teacher’s story, about integrating iPads in her classroom, and how she self-evaluates at intervals, to not just make it effective, but to do with them what she could not have done without. In doing so, she models a critical skill: analyzing her own results, and shifting course toward her desired goals. She gives her students open-ended problems to solve, stimulates their curiosity and differentiates their experience so that they can each challenge themselves in ways that matter, and fosters the internal drive to explore and master that children naturally start life with, but too often lose on their journey through school.

This exemplifies why excellent, engaged teachers are so important to our children’s success in the still-unimagined environment that they will need to navigate later on. We need to value and preserve the professional latitude and space to innovate that this teacher enjoys, and realize the risk to this scenario due to education policy that is overly focused on motivation-killing standardized multiple choice tests, and all of the teaching to the test and mediocrity that follows when those scores become the goal, and not simply a measurement tool.

In life, and in work, we don’t choose “right” answers to canned questions with four choices; we solve open-ended problems for which there may be technical, financial and/or ethical trade-offs, and a best answer that is only clear in hindsight, if at all. For our children, emerging business models and the gravity of the problems they will certainly face make this bubble-focused strategy irrelevant at best, with high risk that it conditions them for passivity, incompetence, and for external validation rather than internal motivation. We also risk chasing our brightest and most talented teachers out of the profession.

As more advanced technology is introduced into the classroom, we must be prepared to expect, and able to trust, that these tools will be used to stretch and to challenge.

Among the many children’s programs offered at Time Space Limited (TSL) in  Hudson, is their Kids Create: Simple Machines program on Saturday mornings from 10am to noon, from January 21st through March 10th. (Scroll down on the Youth Programs page.) Also check out their upcoming programs on bridge building, and music, arts and crafts programs.

The Mud Creak Environmental Learning Center, part of the Columbia County Soil and Water Conservation District, offers snowshoe walks and tracking programs at their Ghent site on Route 66, and in conjunction  with various local libraries. Science isn’t just gadgets, it begins with our own bodies  (snowshoeing is great low-impact exercise) and the natural world around us, and snow and winter give us an opportunity for a different perspective on plants and animals.

For families with children, the Children’s Museum of Science and Technology in Troy has ongoing displays and movies that are projected on their planetarium screen. They also have a science camp for the week of February 20th, and monthly weekday afternoon programs for home schoolers. And a bit further away, but worth the trip, is the Schenectady Museum and Planetarium. Or try the Berkshire Museum’s Feigenbaum Hall of Innovation. (If you are a member of the Kinderhook Memorial Library, their Museum Pass Program includes passes for these last two. Other libraries have Museum Pass Programs, so check to see what’s available.

This is just a sample. I’d love to hear from readers about their favorite winter ways to engage the mind.

I’m not sure what their business model is, or whether they plan to expand beyond Javascript. But it is easy to use, and gives instant feedback to the user as they go through the exercises. If you’re an experienced programmer who has been meaning to experiment with a new language, you can move through quickly and relate it to what you already know. If you are new to programming, you’ll get the jist of a relevant programming language, and learn common concepts, like how variables hold numerical values or strings, and how important it is to remember when to insert quote marks.

There is a social networking component, but it’s not clear if it goes beyond ‘score’ comparisons, or will integrate a forum feature that would let users hash out more advanced exercises together.

If you decide you want to learn more, you can sign up for a college class, find loads of teach-yourself books on any programming language (try several at your local library first, until you find one whose style is effective for you), or try some more advanced online reference resources like W3Schools, or O’Reilly, a favorite of experienced developers. Once you get the basics of a language, keep learning by defining practical problems and writing the code to solve them, working your way up to more complex projects. When you get stuck, there are online discussion forums where users help each other debug their code or find better ways to implement it. When you’re ready, helping other users is a good way to give back to the community.

From time to time, I like to point out some of the technical job openings in the region, and give some insight into some possible paths toward them. Since it’s such a big part the Tech Valley economy, I’m going to start the year off big and highlight the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering (CNSE) research facility, also known as Albany NanoTech. Nanotechnology is materials science on the molecular scale, and the CNSE facility is a consortium of semiconductor, photovoltaic and biotechnology companies who share the leading-edge equipment needed to processes these materials, based around an engineering and science research program at the University at Albany. That includes a lot of companies you may have heard of, like IBM, Intel, AMD and Motorola, as well as the semiconductor consortium Sematech, and a lot of companies that you haven’t. The semiconductor companies are making their chips smaller, faster, and able to run on less power. At least part of the photovoltaic research is targeted at using thinfilms, rather than silicon, a limited resource that threatens to run short due to increased demand from both PV and semiconductor industries.

CNSE is growing and has a page full of job postings that are, minus a few based at a new facility in Rochester, right on the UAlbany campus. Some of them are engineering and science positions that require an advanced degree, like the ones offered at UAlbany, or across the river at RPI. The partner companies also have job openings, some of which are similar to the CNSE openings in requirement and scope.

Technician-level jobs usually require an associate’s degree, like Hudson Valley Community Colleges programs Electrical Technology, or Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology. The technician’s role can range from manufacturing tasks, often at a higher level of training and responsibility than an operator, to equipment calibration, monitoring, or basic maintenance, to assisting the engineering team with experiments or tracking data. In other words, you’re not an engineer, but you participate in the research process, and continue to build skills and experience in the field on the job. You may even decide to pursue a bachelor’s degree or higher at some point.

An associates degree is a viable path to skilled employment in the relative short term – two years, assuming you can jump right into the math and English 101 – with potential for higher education and growth in the future. (A word of caution: If you think you may want to transfer your A.A.S. to a Bachelor’s program, the algebra-based science and electronics classes may not transfer as equivalents to a four-year program, so an A.A.S. is not half of a B.S. Make sure you look ahead at the B.S. requirements and understand the trade-offs. An alternative is to get ahead on your math so you can take, for example, Calculus-based Physics, but it may take you a little longer. Work closely with an advisor if  transferability is a concern.)

You will also find some openings at CNSE that are not directly related to nanotechnology, but are required to keep the facility running smoothly: media and marketing, facilities management, IT helpdesk or networking, and human resources.

The most entry-level nanotechnology-related job here is Process Operator. Ideally they require a technical associates degree, and related experience, but if you have a history of technical proficiency and can address the specific skills they’re looking for, then there’s nothing to lose by applying. The job also requires being certified for the Emergency Response Team, so if you have related training from volunteering with your fire department, or worked or trained for the medical field, that would be an advantage. And don’t underestimate the value of good communication skills. Communication is a big part of most technical jobs: reporting status, handing off tasks to counterparts on other shifts, and summarizing process and equipment problems at the appropriate level of detail for peers, engineering or management. These jobs are almost always twelve-hour shifts, on an alternating three- or four-day work week, and may be days or nights.

If nanotechnology is an area of interest for you, then in the mean time, you can begin to move in this direction by taking some classes toward a technical degree and/or working toward some of the other requirements. If that means starting by reviewing your math and language arts basics because you’ve been out of school for awhile, so be it. Start where you are, and take it step by step. Like career self-help guru Barbara Sher says, “It’s only too late if you don’t start now.”

Instead of leaving unallocated bandwidth that could fuel job-creating innovation or competition that stimulates price reductions and quality improvements, or white space that might allow regions to solve their own broadband access challenges, the plan would sell off the spectrum to the nation’s largest providers. The legislation was not a standalone bill, but added by House Republicans to the Social Security payroll tax extension bill. It is likely that the measure will face opposition in the Senate.

You can test your connection speed by going to the speedtest.net site recommended in the article (make sure you click on the ‘Begin Test’ button, not the ‘Scan Now’ button, which appears to be an ad that prompts you to download an executable file – something you never do from an unknown source), the FCC’s Consumer Broadband Test, or the NYS Broadband Speed Test (requires Javascript). Testing from a single wired computer during non-peak times should give you a result closest to the theoretical/advertised speed. Testing it at peak times, or whenever your connection seems slow, can tell you what your connection speed is for typical use. Your achievable speed will be degraded when you share bandwidth with other activity in your neighborhood, including your own home. In other words, if someone in your house is streaming a movie or watching YouTube videos while you’re checking out graphic-rich news content, your piece of the bandwidth pie is going to shrink.

What if your tests show that you’re not getting the bandwidth that your provider advertises for the service level that you subscribe to? First, make sure your equipment (router/modem) are specified to handle the advertised speeds, and that you’re connected in the fastest way possible. For example, an Ethernet cable will give you a faster connection to your PC than wireless. Then run tests at different times with one or more of the above tools, including probable non-peak-traffic times. Mid-morning is usually a good bet in a residential area, as is Sunday morning. Expect some of the highest traffic in the 3pm through 11pm range on weekdays.

Keep a log of your results that include date and time. Even better, capture screen shots of your test results by hitting SHIFT-PRT SCRN on your keyboard, opening the Paint utility from your Accessories folder, pasting (or CTRL-V) from the clipboard, and saving it as a file. You can crop it if you wish, giving you a graphic like the one that I show here. The graphic shows my results for RoadRunner Standard, around noon on a Monday. Not bad at all, since advertised download speed is 10Mbps.

If your tests show much lower speeds than you expect, and you’re seeing performance impact during use, start by contacting your provider with your documentation, and making them aware that you believe there’s a problem. If service is sub-par, and they can’t or won’t correct it despite your best attempts to communicate, but you’re not one of the fortunate handful with a second provider choice, consider giving the Better Business Bureau a call.

A possible bright spot: billboards have popped up around the county touting wireless high-speed internet from Greene County NYAIR. With advertised download speeds ranging from 1.0 to 2.0 mbps, depending on service class, and upload speeds from 384kbps to 768kbps, this would be a welcome upgrade from dial-up, and a possible alternative where broadband service is available, but lacking.

It’s a tough climate out there, for certain, but a recent issue of the Capital Region weekly The Business Review highlighted some local companies who are finding and pursuing opportunities in their markets. The article about Plug Power jumped out at me for a few reasons. First, their rate of growth is striking, and the message from management shows the clarity of purpose behind their success. One result is the impressive number of relatively entry level manufacturing jobs they’ve been hiring for in the past year. In the past, these were the kinds of jobs that people could walk into with a high school diploma, a solid work history and some electro-mechanical aptitude, and through some combination of on-the-job training and continuing education, could advance to higher skill, pay and responsibility. Over the past two decades, jobs like like these have diminished, so this is great news for our region. By looking at Plug Power’s higher-level job openings, you can get a sense of the advanced manufacturing and engineering opportunities there.

I will continue to highlight some of the job and industry trends in the region, and provide some insight into how someone without technical training would work toward getting that type of job, in future posts.

Another way to get fiber is to have a powerhouse like Google pick your city to wire. Google chose Kansas City, Kansas, and Kansas City, Missouri from among 1,100 cities that competed to be Google’s pet broadband project. And speaking of contests, Chattanooga, TN has one, to challenge residents to create a startup that uses its new gigabit network. There’s nothing like a good contest to focus people and move them forward.

States and municipalities that see the need are leveraging public-private partnerships, like Seattle and the University of Washington are taking 500 miles of fiber into their own hands.

Other countries are making broadband a priority, why haven’t we? Massachusetts, Seattle and the Kansas Cities are clearly thinking beyond the wire to any one individual’s computer. There is a bigger picture here that we aren’t even envisioning yet, including for rural communities.