voluntaryXchange

Marking Time

It was a year ago, just about right now, that my son and I threw all his perishables into a box, grabbed a few things, and abandoned his college apartment.†

He doesn’t have a car, so he needed a ride. I-15 was congested going north: lots of Alberta plates, cutting their snowbird season short. Coming south, the road was deserted.

Less than 10 weeks before that, I’d first heard of the unusual cases of pneumonia in China.

Less than 8 weeks before that, I’d first told my upper level macroeconomics course that they needed to start paying attention to what was going on in China. Putting together that first Monday lecture took non-stop work from the time class had ended on Friday. I started it by noting the pandemic “might be economic if it gets bad enough”.

Less than 6 weeks before that, we’d flown him down here for a fancy birthday dinner.

Less than 4 weeks before, we’d told him to start buying extra pantry stuff on each trip to the grocery.

Less than 2 weeks before, the University of Washington was the first one to close down for the remainder of the Spring semester.

The week before I picked him up had been spring break at his school. He’d stayed (like he usually does). As his break progressed, he shifted from I’m not coming back, to maybe next week, till after this thing I have to do early next week. By Thursday he was saying Sunday might work. Early Friday afternoon, he said come within 24 hours. He’d been in his favorite professor’s office when the calls started, one-by-one cancelling his travelling engagements for the next several months.

It was our last week before spring break. I literally told that advanced class on Monday that it would take a “basketball player or a game show host” getting sick to convince people this was real. On Wednesday night, the former happened. Best and worst prediction I’ve ever made.

I knew the death rates. I ran the math. At that time, the odds were better than 50/50 that someone in my immediate family would die.

It’s a year later. That college student is still living with us. For him, remote learning is actually an improvement. Not one of us has gotten COVID-19. Another kid moved out, but she stays healthy and safe. Two of us have been vaccinated.

† I’m going by the 365 day calendar. It was a Saturday that I’d made that trip. He paid rent on that empty place. Two months later, we drove up there together and put all his stuff in a storage unit.

Dear Smith College

If you haven’t heard about this:

It’s so mellow it’s tough to listen to, but it’s worth it. She’s braver than I am.

Finding Out the Hard Way

Cold Spring Shops on the COVID-19 experiences of colleges and their students:

Is anybody really surprised that when you peddle the residential campus experience as a social experience, and the classroom stuff might be secondary, that people might take you up on the offer?

I hadn’t thought about it that way yet. But yeah … I do notice there’s a lot less outbreaks at commuter schools and community colleges — where students take their studies briefly and then head to home or work.

Cross-posted from SUU MacroBlog, which is required reading for my macroeconomics classes.

Just Wondering …

How soon until you can buy a diversity and inclusion statement, now required when you apply for some jobs, that will score enough points on the rubric for you to be considered?

I am envisioning something like a student buying a term paper: go on the dark web, pay your price, boost your chances.

As a friend of someone who graduated with an English degree from one of the California universities, and then embarked on a four year career of writing papers for pay submitted mostly to the same university … I’d guess fairly soon.

Georgia Tech Faculty Revolt

Faculty at Georgia Tech are up in arms about the state of Georgia’s plans for how universities will run in the fall when they re-open.

GT is going to try to do face-to-face, with professors required to wear masks, but students not required to wear masks.

A supermajority of faculty signed the statement.

Do keep in mind that the dominoes of university closings in the spring started with a single one. That was the University of Washington, in a state with an early outbreak that never got out of hand.

Currently Georgia Tech has students living in fraternity housing over the summer, and has had about a dozen test positive.

Via Marginal Revolution.

Cross-posted from SUU Macroblog, which is required reading for my macroeconomics classes.

Masks In America

This is the top image on foxnews.com this morning:

Six people, presumably in line for COVID-19 testing, and 2 of the 6 can’t wear the mask properly.

And yeah … I’ll admit partial coverage is better than no coverage.

P.S. Part of me also wants to be ticked about 5 of 6 of them being on their phones … when I’m on mine when in line, I’m typically reading a book. I don’t think all five of them are reading books.

FWIW: About 3 years ago I started taking off points on exams in principles classes for students who were unable to follow directions: a point for each infraction. It’s a pretty bizarre experiment. Many students lose points here and there, some consistently lose several points each time, and whole classes will do worse on this if not reminded often. Directions are, of course, not hidden, and nowhere but the top front of the exam. It has really just amounted to a new way to put distance between the A students and the not-A students.

Still Here

I have not gone missing. Due to COVID-19, I have been posting like crazy at SUU MacroBlog (over 100 posts there since late January).

SUU MacroBlog is where I cover current events for my advanced macroeconomics class.

I was on top of the pandemic coverage for them from late January; it was obvious to me that it might turn out to be a major macroeconomic event.

That’s an understatement.

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On a related note, f**k the EU.

For year, I have written most of my blog posts in Open Live Writer, and before that Windows Live Writer.

But now, due to EU regulations, Blogger no longer accepts posts containing (potentially copyrighted) images from third party software.

SUU MacroBlog is hosted by Blogger, and has been since 2009.

For my workflows, this means that I now have to write posts in 2 different softwares. That’s not much of a problem, but it makes cross-posting from one blog to the other very difficult.

So, in the past, any of the work over there that I wanted to post here to look current was just a click away. Not anymore.

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So, if you’re interested, head over to SUU MacroBlog. There’s quite a bit there about interpreting the statistics associated with COVID-19.

Yeah Online!

My university is trying to go big online. This is starting out with 2 graduate programs and a long-term alliance with a private firm. Mixed feelings everywhere about this (we’ve had 3 people strike out with MBA managerial economics, so I think that qualifies as a new inning or something).

Here’s a piece from the Chronicle entitled “Purdue Global Has Had a Rocky Start. Is It Growing Pains or a Sign of Trouble?” about Purdue’s experience after buying Kaplan.

Two and a half years later, the audacious deal is showing signs of trouble. Daniels, who had predicted that the deal would produce a “very substantial revenue stream,” has said that Purdue University Global, as the former Kaplan online programs are now known, is not “achieving the growth we thought we might.” The university’s annual financial report, released this month, shows that Purdue Global suffered a $43-million loss last year …

Hat tip to the vXassociatechair.

Measuring a Deep State

Here’s a proposal: one might measure the size and strength of a deep state by the inability to move parts of it out of a desirable central location.

For example, if our elected officials can’t readily move bureaucratic offices and departments out of the D.C. metropolitan area, then the deep state is quite strong. This point is made by askblog.

Or, since I work at a university, if you can’t move administrative offices out of administrative suites and buildings,  then the deep state within that school is quite strong.

Be Coachable

Bob Bowman: “The most important thing is, he’s very coachable.”

That’s a lesson most people could stand to learn. I know I could (although I’ve gotten better at this, with effort).

This video came from the vXyoungman, who was a competitive swimmer in high school.†

He brought this up to me in trying to explain what he got out of athletics (he’s a music major who wants to be concert pianist). He’s fairly assertive that a big problem in music is that a lot of players aren’t very coachable, and a lot of music “coaches” aren’t very constructive.

FWIW: He loves VV, the professor he’s worked with for 2 years.

† The video comes from an ABC show I’ve never heard of from 2009-10, Shaq vs.