The Third Place: Libraries at the Heart of Community
“Nothing contributes so much to one’s sense of belonging to a community as much as ‘membership’ in a third place.” Ray Oldenburg, Ph.D, author The Great Good Place Ray Oldenburg is a Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of West Florida in Pensacola. His...
Jim Carrey and the Life Authentic
When you are authentic, transparent, you will stand out as you are truly seen. When you are transparent, others can "see through" you into you as your heart and true essence shines. You are clear, direct and kind. You are not an enigma; you don't leave people...
Making Matters: National Day of Making 2014 – June 18th, 2014
Our Nation is home to a long line of innovators who have fueled our economy and transformed our world. Through the generations, American inventors have lit our homes, propelled humanity into the skies, and helped people across the planet connect at the click of a...
The Creative Power of Play
Children are born scientists. They are always turning over rocks and plucking petals off flowers. They are always doing stuff that, by and large, is destructive. That’s what exploration really is when you think about it. An adult scientist is a kid who never grew up....
Eureka!Factory Presents Our Red Bull Creation 2014 Qualifier: The InstaHam!
So for this year's Red Bull Creation 2014 Qualifying round, we were challenged to consider a way to make the world a better place, or at least a more fun and interesting place. We went with fun and interesting, because anything that makes it fun and interesting, can...
The Patience to Succeed: Playing the Long Game
“Today, we want success in seventeen levels, or seventeen minutes, seventeen seconds — and when the promise of something new and better is just a click away, who wants to wait seventeen years? But that’s the thing that connects all of these great people — they played...
The Library of the Future: Collaborative & Community Driven
“Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future.” Ray Bradbury Google "Library of the Future" and you get 350 million results. Many examinations of the 21st century library include comments like "this isn't your childhood library" or "no longer a...
In Celebration of Questions & Red Bull Creation
It's that time of year again, when we get together with a motley collection of friends for the annual running of the Red Bull Creation challenge! This is the third year we've participated in the competition, a quirky contest of ingenuity, endurance and good humor. The...
Empowered Learning: Co-Authoring our Future
"You can make the whole room smarter than any of the individuals in the room alone, including the instructor. There’s a radical shift in this way of doing things — it's built on trust, and I think our existing school structures are built more on dependency and control...
Look Up: A Thoughtful Study in Irony
Give people your love, don't give them your 'like' - Gary Turk An article ran in the Atlantic a couple of weeks ago titled, "My Students Don't Know How to Have a Conversation." In the article, educator Paul Barnwell described his students' struggle to master a session...