I have received this request from a friend roughly 5,000 miles away: My maternal cousin has to prepare a write up for her school.  She needs to write something on 'fun physics'. Alas, I am…

Continuing today's theme of science and the Obama administration... Physicist John Holdren will be Obama's science advisor. I was hoping we'd finally get a biologist in that position, but his…

Larry Summers says that R&D spending should not be part of an economic stimulus package, contrary to what many scientists were probably hoping for. Summers actually has a good point. The…

A greater commitment by science faculty to focus on science education could drive education reform at universities and K-12 schools, according to a new report by a team of five researchers from the…

Ivory towers are replacing smoke stacks in Alabama and all over the US. This can be a good thing, but there is a core problem: Until relatively recently, most universities and the cities surrounding…

Parents of children with intellectual disabilities have long been frustrated by intelligence quotient (IQ) testing that tells them little to nothing about the long-term learning potential of their…

Obama is going to appoint a Nobel-prize winning physicist to be his Energy Secretary. I don't know anything about the physicist, Steven Chu (except that he's director of the Lawrence Berkely National…

College tuition has increased 439% since 1984, and the net yearly cost of college at a 4-year public university is 76% of the median family income, according to a story in today's NY Times. Even…

Official professional standards in both Scotland and England which aim to nurture the development of new teachers pay too little attention to what 'becoming' a teacher is really like, according to…

There is an interesting story in New Scientist about The Science&Entertainment Exchange, a program initiated by the National Academy of Sciences to improve the science in movies and TV [New…