Adding www.ikeptmyhair.com Sept 2018. Another P.E.O sister shared how she kept her hair after chemo and created an amazing website to help others. We must create together. We must continue her dreams in the sand. I miss her but see her spirit as my granddaughter plays with her mermaids.
March 2015 … I can’t stop thinking about how fast I lost a friend to cancer, a P.E.O. sister, and former President of our AAUW chapter. It was on January 27th that Betty McCutchan was facilitating a table at the training for presenters for the Expanding Your Horizons Conference. A conference to inspire middle school girls to study STEM fields. Cancer took her away on March 8th.
I am not sure if you have read “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch who was a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon. In his book he said “I want to create more research brains to create a cure for the cancer that is killing me.” I just watched his video again, Really Achieving your Childhood Dreams, and thought of Betty, and wonder how we can continue Betty’s dreams.
In 2008 I dedicated a video to Randy Pausch featuring my grandson: I did I.T.! : Puzzles – An EC Assessment Tool. I just returned from SxSWEdu and heard speaker after speaker talk about solutions, which are nothing more than what I have been fighting to implement in the classroom for decades. Even my 10 year-old grandson Gage can tell you the solution, eliminate grades and B&W worksheets. He said he understands math when he does a project about what he is learning and is not worried about his score. It is challenging research and development that inspires innovation and creativity… Building Dreams, building research brains.
We must make the paradigm shift to 21st century learning NOW! I walked through his future middle school and saw desks in a row. For Gage, for all students, this factory mode classroom must be removed. We need a STREAM of change to solve the equation. Schools must be builders of dreams!!
From the specials on CBS Sunday Morning News: “Many thought this was crazy – but drive created miracles.” “Awaking the power … We didn’t know what it would do …” … “It only comes from research. ”
We need to get kids out of the fish tank and add STEM Solutions.
Update 12/2020: Scroll to bottom on this post about my local concern on cancer and what may be in the lake water where I live. On that webpage I posted this video on Childhood Cancer.