Time was, we thought that people, students, who wanted answers to questions, could come to our office hours, ask, and be answered. Then we thought that these people could pose these questions to bulletin boards and forums on the Internet,… Read moreThe Internet as an Educational Tool

The Times has written a blog-article on the proportion of the new UK government who went to Oxford (in fairness, I must point out that some proportion went to the Other Place, which is also rumored to be quite good)…. Read moreOxford Up There Again

Well, folks, the promised “reform of the reform” has started. In my last post, I mentioned some of the troubles the transition from traditional german Diplom to Bachelor’s-Master’s degree courses has caused at my university. The Rectory has made money… Read moreReform of the Reform

The university where I teach, the University of Bielefeld, is forty years old this month. It was founded as a «reform university». Everything was in one huge building, as may be seen in this picture. The building has two main… Read moreTo Be a Master

I was saddened yesterday to learn of the death of John Stallings exactly one year before. John was a mercurial Berkeley mathematician of occasional genius who, if you believed him, mostly enjoyed sleeping, doing nothing, and various scurrilous activities. Including,… Read moreTwo Birds of Different Feathers