It's Ada Lovelace Day!

Ada Lovelace

(photo from Wikimedia Commons)

It's Ada Lovelace Day, an international blogging celebration of women in the sciences and technology that is named for the person often considered to be the world's first computer programmer (see Wikipedia article).

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For my contribution to the celebration, I would like to recognize Sonja Gonzalez, who is currently Director of Technology for the Oyster River School District in New Hampshire. This district was recognized by Offspring magazine as one of the 100 top school districts in the U.S.

Sonja Gonzalez, going places

When I worked with Sonja, we were in a much smaller and less recognized rural K-8 school in Fremont, New Hampshire. She was Director of Technology; I was the School Library Media Specialist.

I want to tell you about what a difference Sonja made to the staff and students there.

Sonja did what an ideal technology director should do--she kept up with the latest changes in her field and used whatever means she could to funnel those new technologies into our hands. As every teacher knows, having the technology (say, laptops for all of your students) is meaningless if you don't know what to do with it. Sonja taught us how to use equipment and software to make better learning experiences for our students. She led workshops, made learning opportunities available to us both on- and off-campus, and was a model user of technology herself.

She tirelessly researched grants and wrote applications for funding, greatly expanding the possibilities in a school where money was always scarce. By the time she left, classrooms had computer workstations, access to portable laptop labs, and a greatly improved stationery computer lab.

Every teacher knew how to use technology to enhance their teaching and simplify the record-keeping chores that take up so much time in a teacher's day.

It was because of Sonja that I was able to "fly" a fourth grade class to Shibuya, Japan via Google Earth, as an introduction to a book set there (see The Librarian as Travel Agent). Sonja also introduced me to blogging, and here I am, 2 blogs and over 1200 posts later! (She also introduced quite a few of us staffers to the art of making sushi during a memorable how-to luncheon held in the library, but that is probably a story for another time).

For all that she did for me, and for our school, faculty, and students, I would like to send her a big

Thank you, Sonja!

You are really making a difference!

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I would love to hear about women in science and technology who have made a difference in your life. Just leave a comment on this post.

Read more about Ada Lovelace Day and find other bloggers taking part in the celebration.

Did You Know?

Karl Fisch, a high school administrator at Arapahoe High School in Littleton, Colorado, pulled together a powerpoint with “some interesting ideas” for teachers at his school. Later, Jeff Bronman and Scott Mcleod, a professor at the University of Minnesota, generalized the presentation. 

Organizing the World's Information

As a librarian, I have spent my life learning how information is organized and how we can best access and use it (my last school library's mission statement was to ensure that students and staff are effective users of ideas and information), so I am naturally drawn to learning everything I can about Google, the company, and its people. Who wouldn't be interested in a company that has bicycles and exercise balls in its hallways, sofas and dogs in its offices, and bins of M & Ms and gummi bears in its snack rooms?

Google was founded only a decade ago and it has long been an essential part of our lives. Here is the Google mission statement: To organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and available, a job that Google CEO Eric Schmidt estimated (in 2005) would take around 300 years. 

One of the ideas that makes the company great is its 70/20/10 philosophy: It spends 70% of its resources on its core business, the search; 20% on related areas, such as Google News and Google Earth; and 10% on employee initiated projects that may be related to nothing else that Google currently works on. Imagine what your job would be like if your boss asked you to devote 10% of your work day exploring subjects of interest to you! The results for the employee? Personal freedom, intellectual stimulation, and loyalty to the company. The results for Google? Innovations that become important in the long run. 

Here is the Google Factory Tour webcast--an exploration of the company, its people, and its ideas and philosophy. The video is several hours long, but I am working my way through it and am finding every minute fascinating. It took place way back in 2005, even before the release of Google Earth, but it is still a window into one of the world's most innovative and successful companies.

The Librarian as Travel Agent

Linda, over at the 7MSN Ranch (stands for seven miles south of nowhere), has a great post today about the wonders of Google Earth. She talks about the amazing way Google Earth lets you fly all around the world and swoop down for close up images of almost any place. I've noticed that more and more people are downloading their photos there so that you can feel as though you are driving or walking right through the neighborhood you are exploring. 

All of this reminded me of the first time I introduced Google Earth to the kids in my school library. For once, I was ahead of them in technology, thanks to our visionary Technology Director! I was lucky enough to have a big touch screen (an interactive whiteboard called a Smart Board) that was hooked up to the computer so that I could control the computer applications with a finger's touch on the board. No matter what I did with that Smart Board, they were my audience, always watching to see what magic would happen next. Everything I ever taught them using that equipment was hardwired into their brains and they could discuss it all with me months later. It was a great teaching tool. 

One week I was beginning a new read-aloud with the fourth grade classes. The book was called Hachiko Waits by Leslea Newman. It is about a loyal Japanese dog who waited daily at the train station for his dead master to return. How we loved that book! We branched out to talk about loyalty, friendship, World War II, Japan's history and its language and alphabet... there was no end of discussion and learning once we got into that book. 

You've probably heard that American students are notoriously weak in their knowledge of geography and maps. Before I introduced Hachiko, I decided to "fly" the class to Shibuya, Japan, where the events in the story take place. When they arrived at the library, they all sat down in their regular seats to write in their reading logs. I announced that we were going on a big field trip without leaving the library, which intrigued them, of course. Then, turning out the lights and telling them to fasten their seat belts, I started manipulating the board and the Google Earth application. 

They leaned forward in their seats as a bird's eye view of the main street of our own little Fremont, New Hampshire appeared on the screen. There was our school! Suddenly, our "plane" took off and up with breathtaking speed, flew over the ocean and around the world, then plummeted down to Japan, quickly zeroing in on Shibuya. They were stunned, they were excited, they were turned on by learning, and they never forgot the geography lesson. This was one class that would always be able to locate Japan on a map!

"An Out-of-Touch Luddite, or Worse, Old"

The title of this post is a quote from a piece on National Public Radio (The End of Offline in Flight? Say it Ain't So, by Eric Weiner, Feb. 11, 2009). Mr. Weiner was saying that he worries about some airlines allowing the use of electronic devices during flights. Weiner used to love his time in flight and offline--it gave him time to think without being plugged in.

That sent me off on a thought flight of my own, but I was thinking about that now old-hat, old- school communication device--the cell phone. Like Weiner, I prize my moments of disconnectivity. You see, I have a confession to make: I don't own a cell phone. 

There. I said it. Please clear the aisles so all four of my loyal readers can stampede toward the exits. 

I've tried to want to have a cell phone. I've tried to want to be able to multitask and talk about private issues in public places. I know that I should have one for safety's sake, but then I think about the fact that, in my town, every place is only about fifteen minutes away from any other place and if worse came to worse, I could walk home if the car broke down. Besides, we are surrounded by kind, church-attending Good Samaritan-wannabes who would no doubt stop to help me if they saw me stranded. 

I actually owned a cell phone for a year. My son called me on my land line and asked about it. 

Son: So, Mom, what's your cell phone number?

Me: I'm afraid I don't know. 

Son: How can you not know?

Me: I never use it. 

Son: How can you never use it?

Me: I don't turn it on. I just have it for emergencies. 

Son: Then how can I call you??????

I was awfully glad to have that emergency cell phone with me when my car slid off an icy rural New Hampshire road and went over a stone wall. The only problem was that, once I had managed to stop shaking, open the car door in the deep snow, and open up the cell phone---I had absolutely no idea how to use it. The nice man who stopped to help me kindly called the police, AAA, and my husband for me. After that, I gave up my cell phone. 

I know they are convenient, but don't you sometimes find them a little intrusive? I don't need to know every little detail and every little move that my friends and family are making. I have a relative who, during the course of a journey to visit me from a nearby state, kept me apprised of his/her every move--"I'm leaving right now." Next call: "I'm at the intersection of 12th and Atlantic." Next call: "I'm coming up to the toll gates." Yikes! In between calls, I was trying to get the house ready for company, and I wasn't making much progress because of all of our "communication."

So here's my question to you. I'm sure I'm practically the only one left in America without a cell phone, but on the off chance that you are also in that rapidly shrinking group, please let me know in the comments. Or, if you "carry," do you love your cell phone? Could you or couldn't you live without it? I'd like to know. 

I'd like to think that I am a reasonable person, not an anti-technology one (the very definition of Luddite, as I've come to understand). I'm a librarian, for heaven's sake, and if there is any group of people in America who has been thrust into the new technology with more gusto than librarians, I'd like to hear about that, too.