This week was very busy, because I had lots of meetings to go to. On Monday Sarita, Taneshia, and I had a progress meeting. We talked about the work we did last week and all the stuff we had to do this week. After finishing the syllabus for the course, at least the non-project portion, I moved on to my next piece of work. So my next task was to figure out how to use media wiki and post the syllabus on our wiki page. Figuring out how to use media wiki was difficult at first, but Taneshia and I worked together to figure it out. Once we figured out the basics of how it works, the rest was relatively simple. So the syllabus I put together last week is now posted on the wiki.
My next task was to figure out the design and interactions of how people will work with and use our wiki, and make a list of things we need to change. So I made a series of mock screen shots that show what tabs, links, and sidebar items we need. This was much more difficult than I thought it would be. We are starting by making a single page that everyone will use, students and teachers alike. We did this to keep it simple, but at times it was difficult to determine what was necessary for both groups.
On Tuesday all of the undergraduates in the ELC lab went to a meeting with some students in a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) group. We met each other and talked about various things about this summer. We talked about the work we are doing, where we are living, and the possibility of planning some social events.
On Wednesday, I went to a lunch-time talk that Sarita was giving to some high school teachers who taught intro to programming. At first her talk started out about the research that goes on in our lab, however the focus changed when the teachers seemed very interested in online communities that they had heard about, but had never experienced first hand. Sarita showed them Facebook, MySpace, and Second Life. She also told them how these communities can now be used to teach programming because their APIs are now public. The teachers were interested in this idea, however they still wanted the sites to stay blocked in their classrooms. I found the teachers' opinions and ideas about these sites to be very interesting and it gave me a lot to think about afterwards. I still am not sure whether or not social networking sites should be blocked in schools.
The second meeting I went to on Wednesday was our weekly update meeting for the ELC Lab. The snacks were delicious as usual and everyone is working very hard. Last on Wednesday, I went to a Broadening Participation in Computing meeting. This is an effort that is sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to increase the enrollment of women and minorities in computing. The statistics about how much enrollment in computer science has gone down are staggering. This makes me worry about the future of our field, but at the same time it makes me proud to be a woman in computer science, overcoming the odds!
Those are all of the major things that happened at work this week. Outside of work, I went to the Summer Festival at the Virginia Highlands and saw lots of artisans and their work. There were paintings, photographs, ceramics, quilts, glass, and almost any art you can think of. I really enjoyed looking around and if I weren't a poor college student I could have spent a lot of money! I also spent some time exploring the area around where I live. I found two coffee shops within walking distance of where I live. After trying them both, I like the Octane Coffee bar the best. I found out that they brew the same coffee as my favorite place in Washington DC, which is Murky Coffee!
Week 1
~
Week 2
~
Week 3
~
Week 4
~
Week 5
Week 6
~
Week 7
~
Week 8
~
Week 9
~
Week 10