Read-Think-b4-u-Write

I almost clicked by the title "Pakistani Musicians Play Dave Brubeck's Take Five ", but then curiosity got the better of me -- and am I glad. Take a listen: Sitars? Tabla drums? Violins? What? The Guardian featured the group in a recent article saying, The Sachal Studios Orchestra was created by Izzat Majeed, a philanthropist based in London. When Pakistan fell under the dictatorship of General Zia-ul-Haq during the 1980s, Pakistan’s classical music scene fell on hard times. Many musicians were forced into professions they had never imagined — selling clothes, electrical parts, vegetables, etc. Whatever was necessary to get by. Today, many of these musicians have come together in a 60-person orchestra that plays in a state-of-the-art studio, designed partly by Abbey Road sound engineers. So while we are all so busy trying to get through school, remember you have a long life ahead of you and you need to do something besides work...maybe playing music. What do ...

Diablo Valley College's 3rd Annual Prize for Graphic Literature surpasses all expectations and showcases the art of some amazing aspiring artists. Go Fish by Ana Valdez is the Grand Prize Winner; a story of love where you find it between a lonely fisherwoman and a mermaid. The Runners Up included The Amazing Uncanny Aviator by Emily Pate and Sarah Luver, a spoof of the mainstream superhero comic, and Nick Pino’s Ass Birth One: The Day the Earth Said F@ck , a tale of a boy and his dog. Ass Birth One also won the George Herriman Prize. The Herriman Prize Runner Up was awarded to Kelly Conroy’s Annoying F***tard a knock, knock joke gone incredibly annoying. An Apple A Day Keeps Everyone Else Away by Sheemul Gupta won the Charles Schultz Award with its lifelong tale of technology’s lonely consequences. “What Does He Want…?” by the creative trio Aly Murphy, Dan Povenmire, and Jeff “Swampy” Marsh, was the Shultz Runner Up in its search for the perfect Christmas gift. Dor...

A great combination of college majors! Art, geological and earth sciences, as well as engineering, astronomy or mathematics offer a career in a field you may not even know existed--geoscience. At NASA there is a geoscientist that asks astronauts to snap pictures and take videos of earth from 250 miles above the planet in order to study planet phenomena. It turns out earth has more geographical diversity than we once thought (for example, there's a lot more deltas). But they also produce some beautiful videos, such as Earth at Night . Open Culture also offers a link to What an Astronaut Sees from the International Space Station. Have you ever thought about combining a science major with an arts major? If so, what kind of creative science would you like to be a part of?

People who work from home don't get much done, right? Wrong! According to a recent study conducted by Stanford University if you are a person working on the kitchen table wearing your pajamas you're a more productive worker. Seems counter intuitive, doesn't it? I mean if I could stay at home all day and wander from the computer to the fridge to the computer to the television to the mailbox to the laundry room, well you get the idea. Ctrip, a Chinese travel agency, agreed to be the guinea pig for a work-at-home study and during the 9-month period found: > A 12 percent increase in productivity for the at-home workers. Of that increase, 8.5 percent came from working more hours (due to shorter breaks and fewer sick days) and 3.5 percent came from more performance per minute. The researchers speculate this was due to quieter working conditions. > A 50 percent decrease in attrition among the work-from-home group. > Substantially higher work satisf...

15 Books That Take American Eduction to Task is a post that at first glance is a bit depressing. For you education majors, some of these books may help with research into K-12 practices. Let's take a look at the books devoted to college, they have some useful things to say about what you are doing right now! No. 5 Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses by Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa: Even with ever-higher tuition, more students are heading to college than ever before, but are they really getting the education they’re paying for? Sociology professors Richard Arum and Josipa Roska don’t think so. They have research that points to some disturbing trends in higher ed, including a study which found that 45% of students showed no improvement in key skills, including critical thinking and writing, between their first semester and the end of their second year. They believe that the current culture at most colleges doesn’t adequately value education, preferr...

This post isn't entitled, "How to find a GREAT College Roommate," but "How to find a Decent College Roommate" because while you may think you are looking for a lifelong BFF with whom you can swap college prank stories in your old age, that's not the way it works in the real world. In the real world you end up with roommates that can be slobs, eat all your food, or have late night booty calls with their significant other in your dorm room. Yikes! In an article at USA Today , studies show that one of the top five reasons for leaving college is "roommate conflict." So how do you find a decent roommate? Well, apparently that's not an easy question to answer. But here's how some colleges select your roommates if you choose to live in the dorms: Speed roommate search - think speed dating, but rather than a lifelong commitment, you're looking for someone to spend the next couple of semesters with. College directed selecti...

Intuit put up a flow chart documenting the best (and worst) small business opportunities, and some of them may be surprising to you. Good small businesses include pilates and yoga studios and accessory stores while bad choices range between movie rental franchises, music stories, and bookstores. Surprisingly, electronics (computers, etc.) aren't doing well either. If you plan on opening a small business (or going to work for a small business franchise) consider some of the "good" options. Try working in your dream industry for a while (maybe even take a part time job to pay your tuition bills). Accomplished small business owners and entrepreneurs fail before they ever become successful. In the same way, good salespeople know that they have to get a certain number of "Nos" before they will make a sale. This also translates to the entrepreneur who wants to convince a banker or venture capitalist to invest in his or her business. So if you are planning o...