Between us Girls

The right school

2012-02-01T03:52:00.000-08:00

The next few weekends signal the start of a flurry of open houses--attempts to woo those who passed the ACET to come to us for college. These are grand affairs in which prospective students and their parents (and guardians and siblings) are feted and talked up. I love these events, really, because these are perhaps the only days in the year where you (as an institution) have no choice but to be brilliant, witty, radiant, and all-in-all legendary enough to be deserving of the Philippines Most Wanted.

This afternoon, my colleagues and I were talking strategy. How should we approach these students? What should we say? What *shouldn't* we do? There's a temptation to rattle off a laundry list of all our greatness, but it is possible to say too much. God knows I've been guilty of that.

By the end of the conversation, we decided that, before we talk, we should listen. What is it that the students want for themselves? What are their deciding factors? What are their biases, concerns or apprehensions? Some of the people who come to the open house really aren't open to sales talk--they've made up their minds NOT to come to the Ateneo. So why come to the open house at all? They have their reasons: To touch base with friends, to affirm their decision, to please their parents. There are a few who really are on the fence and it's those whose concerns you have to address honestly and unflinchingly.

The most common question: Which school is better, UP (or DLSU) or Ateneo? The standard answer, one that I honestly believe, is that at this bracket there is no better school. There is only the right school for you. Each school has its own culture, its quirks, its hangups. Where do you fit in? Where can you be most productive? Where can you be most happy? For those who are still on the fence, the open houses are our chance to let them get to know us, to be able to answer those questions with more certainty.

Because that's what the open house is supposed to be: a first date, a chance to make an impression. We know that we won't be the right place for many, but how will they know for sure until they've at least listened and seen what we have to say and show? We do our show-and-tell. This is us, we say. We're smart and gorgeous and loony and fun. If you decide that our brand of crazy is not right for you, that's fair. We part as friends. When I used to give the open house talks for DISCS, I used end my spiel with a line from Fr. Joey Cruz: In the end, we really don't care whether you come to the Ateneo or not, but we would hate to have you NOT come simply because you didn't get to know us.

You should at least know what you're missing.

Swimming against the current

2012-01-29T16:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, Socorro and I went on our first dives in nine weeks. We've been dry since November 19; it was time to get back in the water again.

With Redg, we took a day trip to Anilao. We met with our dive master, Abet, and decided to go on three easy dives: Twin Rocks, Koala and Cathedral. All three sites were close to the resort and could be covered in one morning.

The surface was completely flat, but in the water there was what I considered to be moderate current. The general rule of thumb is to just go with it. Don't try to fight the current because fighting it demands too much energy; you'll consume your air too quickly. Following this rule, most of our bottom time was spent being carried along In Twin Rocks, though, Abet led us up-current. The swim was difficult but not impossible. Divers going against a current are advised swim close to the ocean bottom to minimize drag. When possible, crawl your way to your destination, minding what you grasp. My own hand came too close to an anemonea, prompting an attack from the resident clown fish. It's a good thing I was wearing gloves.

Finally, we reached our destination: A resident school of jacks (talakitok). There were thousands of them, each as the length of a forearm. They surrounded us, a skittish silver cloud.

When we returned to the surface, Abet explained that we had to go against the current to reach the jacks. No problem, I assured him. Some struggles are worth it.

Karma

2012-01-24T18:08:00.001-08:00

I never had to defend a thesis or a dissertation. When I got my MS, our graduation requirement was a paper accepted at a conference. As soon as we had our acceptance in hand, we were done. No panel, no defense. For my PhD, as it was a distance ed degree, my paper went through several rounds of revisions, but I never actually had to fly to the school to face the panel. (That would have been hard: One panelist was from Florida, my adviser was from Nevada, and my third panelist was from the Ateneo.) The distance-ness of the situation didn't mean my panelists let me off easily. They combed through my text, demanding me to interpret and reinterpret my data, something my adviser likened to squeezing blood from a stone. Towards the end, they were correcting the minute details like reference formats and extra spaces between words.

Despite all the rounds of revisions, I still feel as if not having to defend was one less hazing that I had to endure. That's exactly the kind of invitation that karma awaits, and karma is a bitch.

Over the last five years or so, I've gotten into the research game, which, among other htings, entails obtaining and executing grant proposals. DOST has been extremely generous, supportive and kind. However, this does not mean that they write you a check without asking you the hard questions. Each grant proposal goes through one to three presentations. Each presentation is a challenge that has to be taken seriously and treated with respect. You have to prepare to answer two questions: "Is your research worth a damn?" and "If we give you this money, what do we get in return?"

Yesterday, I presented my two research proposals. The panel was composed of people I consider to be my professional friends. As the CS community in this country is so small, everyone knows everyone and, provided you behave honorably and don't try to BS them, everyone is pretty much on your side (if you do try to BS them, they will be the first to rip you a new one).

Well, I left the presentation with my innards intact. I haven't received the decision yet, though. My own sense is that one project is safe, while the other is in peril, and this is not because the latter is without merit. It's because the winds of policy are changing about what the country deems important.

Am I worried? A little. But right now, the matter is out of my hands. We will know in a few months.

Second chances

2012-01-23T16:20:00.000-08:00

You don't get a second chance. Not really. Not for the same thing. You get other opportunities to do similar things, maybe better things--a job offer at the same company, a ticket to visit the same country, a chance at love with the same person--but you never step into the same stream twice. The world would have changed, you would have changed, so the chance is never the same.

We take a chance or give it up based on what's right for us. Discerning the horizon as best we can, we make what we believe is the optimal choice. If we make a mistake, we will get a chance (call it a second? a third? a fourth?) to make amends, to course correct, to do over, to be better. Mostly, though, we should do ourselves the mercy of learning to be happy with the chances we do take and stop torturing ourselves with the roads not traveled.

No guarantees

2012-01-22T19:26:00.000-08:00

With graduation about two months away, the seniors are justifiably nervous about going down from the hill and confronting the real world. Like generations before them, they feel that they hadn't learned enough, that they aren't prepared or equipped for life outside of an academic setting. Some feel as if they are being loaded onto a trebuchet and launched screaming into enemy territory.

When I was Chair, I used to tell the seniors to "be not afraid". They came to us the best of the best. They continued to be the best of the best. However, the reassurance falls on deaf ears. Nothing you say and nothing you've done is ever enough to convince them that they will be fine. No guarantee (and there are no guarantees) will chase their insecurities away. There's no real answer to one's fears--not one from outside anyway. Ultimately, the you have to confront your fears and defeat them yourself.

The ceiling effect

2012-01-22T15:43:00.000-08:00

When educators or learning scientists introduce educational interventions into the classroom, they almost always observe a ceiling effect: The interventions have little to no effect on students who are already very good. This is consistent with what can observe in life in general. Those of us who are already good writers, math wizards, computer geeks, and so on can survive, even thrive, under the most hostile of educational circumstances.

The same is not true of weaker students. Students who have very little knowledge to start, have been educationally marginalized in some way, who have low spatial abilities or low working memory capacities--these are the students who are most badly affected by poor education and who can most greatly benefit from mentoriship and from well-designed instruction. Therefore, one prescription for educational interventions is to design and implement them for the people who need them most.

Book abuse

2012-01-20T17:58:00.000-08:00

Earlier this year, I was trying to explain one of the differences between a primitive variable in Java and an object variable. I said that if a and b are both ints and you say a = b;, you make a copy of the data. Changing b's value will not affect a's value. Not so with objects. If a = b then a and b point to the same object, and a.somefield = x; is the same as b.somefield.x; has the same effect.

To make the point, I used a book analogy. I said that if a and b are primitives and you say a = b;, you have two copies of the same book that are independent from one another. Writing your name on copy a will not write your name on copy b. On the other hand, if a and b are objects, to say a = b is to say that you are sharing an book. To highlight copy a is to highlight copy b.

I then recounted that I cut my copy of Prisoner of Azkaban. I was about to leave on a long trip and was several chapters away from the end. Goblet of Fire had just come out and I wanted to bring it along. I didn't want to carry both copies, so I cut out the remaining chapters of book 3. Oh, and yes, my copy was hardbound.

My class freaked. How can you do that to Harry Potter?!

But this is how I am with my books. I dog-ear them. I highlight them. I make marginal notes. My cookbooks have it much worse. They're floured, oiled and sauced. I've dropped them. I've broken their spines. I've undone the binding. (The stains on my cookbooks are a logfile of my development as a cook.)

The Rizal Library recently quotes Neil Gaiman as saying:

“[D]on't ever apologize to an author for buying something in paperback, or taking it out from a library (that's what they're there for. Use your library). Don't apologize to this author for buying books second hand, or getting them from bookcrossing or borrowing a friend's copy. What's important to me is that people read the books and enjoy them, and that, at some point in there, the book was bought by someone. And that people who like things, tell other people. The most important thing is that people read... ”

Well, Neil, I hope you feel the same way about how I abuse my books. This is how I show them that I love them.

Doubt vs fear

2012-01-18T00:42:00.000-08:00

In the middle of celebrating the ACET results, many of my friends and colleagues chided me with, "Was there ever any doubt that Socorro would get in?" To this, I would reply, "There was no doubt, but there was fear."

Sh*t happens. I've seen it happen many times. To swagger with overconfidence is to invite karma to suckerpunch the wind out of you. Socorro prepared as best she could and I knew her chances were better than good. That said, a little fear keeps you humble and makes you regard these achievements as the blessings they truly are.

Next up: QPI.

Advice to freshmen

2012-01-14T23:53:00.000-08:00

I've been teaching in the Ateneo on and off (mostly on) since 1988--yes, I'm THAT old. With my own daughter about to don the Ateneo blue, my mind races through over two decades of experience with college students. What can I tell her, I ask myself, to help her survive? Can I draw her a map? Can I steer her clear of the all the potholes? Can I give her a push up the inclines and catch her when she falls? Yes, I know: Even if I could (and I *can't*), I shouldn't. All I can do is reiterate some of the advice we usually give to all our freshmen.

College is hard. You are among the very brightest in the country. A very large percentage of the kids we accept were honor students in high school. If you're in a science course (and you are), chances are you're sitting next to a valedictorian (if you aren't one yourself). Your teachers know this, and we teach to that level. The pace of the courses tends to be aggressive. Expect a lot of content that takes time and energy to digest.

Go easy on the extracurriculars. Join an org or two, yes, but maybe not 5. Because, who are we kidding, you won't be active in all of them. They're just colorful add-ons to your resume.

You will think that you have a lot of time, but really you don't. You will need the time to write your English term papers, study for the next math long test, and finish your natsci experiement, all of which happen to to be due on the same day.

Students tend to cram. This is something I strongly, strongly discourage. Spread the work over time. It accumulates as the sem passes. Don't wait until the deadlines are upon you. Spare yourself the insanity. My theory is that people cram because they want an excuse in case they get a terrible grade at the end, "Oh, I just crammed that paper" or "Oh, I really didn't have enough time." They want an excuse because they're afraid that if they actually did do their best, they'd find that it still isn't enough. Don't get into the habit, or if you already have it, break it.

I offer an alternative approach: Decide how much effort you want to put in something, and then let it ride. If you don't honestly care about being on the Dean's List, then just do enough to pass. If, on the other hand, you want to impress the crap out of your creative writing teacher, then do as Walter Wellesley "Red" Smith says and open up a vein and bleed--I mean that in a metaphorical sense, of course. I have one student now who embodies this approach completely. He's smart enough to get whatever grades he wants and is self-aware enough to know how much effort he has to put in to get them. However, he has a life (yes, kids have that now), so he either dials up or dials down his academic efforts, depending on what he wants to achieve. At first blush, that sounds very anti-Magis, I know. My point, though, is that you have to decide what sort of life you want, and go for it.

That said, you should always, always, be aware of your obligations. We work very hard to send you to the Ateneo. (To those on scholarship, your benefactors chose you from many other applicants, some of whom would probably donate a kidney to have what you've been given.) As deserving as you are, deserving you must continue to be. Don't piss the opportunity away.

Live with the future in mind. If you decide to experiement with sex, drugs, or alcohol--worse yet, if post pictures of these experiments on Facebook--ask your spin doctors to start preparing your future press statements. The Internet is forever and all of these things will come back to bite you. Does that mean you should live cowering in fear? No. It means you be willing to accept the consequences of however you choose to live.

Finally, be kind to yourself. In the novel Admission, Jean Hanff Korelitz speaks about how our excellent, excellent students' greatest fear was discovering they were the average man:

Inside every one of her fellow students...was a person who didn't live up to his or her own expectations, a person too fat, too slow, whose hair wouldn't hold a curl, who had no gift for languages, who lacked the gene for math. They were convinced that they were not all they'd been cracked up to be: the track star, classicist, valedictorian, perennial leading lady, campus fixer, or teacher's favorite. The driven ones she'd known in college feared they weren't driven enough, and the slackers were sure they'd find out how deficient they are if they ever did apply themselves... She knew that they were soft-centered, emotional beings wrapped in a terrified carapace, that even though they might appear rational and collected on paper, so focused that you wanted to marvel at their promise and maturity, they were lurching, turbulent muddles of conflict in their three-dimensional lives...They feared they were ordinary kids,..., not the brilliant sparks they had unexpectedly persuaded grownups they were. Ordinary and thoroughly average. Ordinary and undeserving.

You aren't ordinary. (None of you are.) You (all of you) have the potential to do great things. That doesn't mean you will be the best (or that you *have* to be the best). That doesn't mean you'll never fail. Just don't let yourself be racked with self-doubt, and don't equate your grades with your self-worth. You can do this.

Conference season

2012-01-10T19:15:00.000-08:00

The Christmas break up to about the second week of March are "conference season" for me. Most of the conferences I try to attend have deadlines during this period. Much of my time during these months is spent crunching data, wrestling with the image handling features of Word and thinking of synonyms for "refers to" and "implies".

If you're done with data collection, you have a semi-decent review of lit, and your collaborators are ping-able, you can put together an acceptable 10-page conference paper in about a week. However, it is always good to give yourself a very long runway. It has happened to my collaborators and me more than once that we have had to revisit the data and redo analyses (it is happening now, even as I write this). You have to give yourself and your collaborators time to contribute meaningfully to the work. Giving them the paper the night before it's due--what good is supposed to come out of that except *maybe* proofreading? No, that is almost pointless. The work will end up being sloppy, careless, with little to no value added.

Working with me on a conference paper means working over a period of weeks, iterating through multiple drafts, writing and rewriting not until the deadline but until we are satisfied. This is why conference season is tends to be intense for me. (2011 was so intense, I didn't want to write anymore after April.) I am fortunate in that my co-authors are committed to producing quality publications--many hands make light work. Working with them makes the intensity of the season easier to bear and the harvest at the end all the sweeter.

The things I shouldn't know

2012-01-08T15:32:00.000-08:00

There are faculty members to whom students naturally gravitate. They act as counsellors, confessors, drinking buddies, friends. They are repositories of secrets, of self-revelations. I am not one of those faculty members. While I do get close to some of my students, I am generally not the person they run to when they need a shoulder to cry on or a pat on the back.

And this is ok. Knowledge in my hands is dangerous, and I caution students against revealing too much to me. Why? Because you can't expect me to just listen and not act. For example, we invited one of our returning JTA students to take part in the orientation for the prospective JTAers. He started his talk with "The first thing you do is get a fake ID..." I stood up and said, "No, no, no! You don't get to say stuff like that in an official orientation!" I'm sure all kinds of stuff goes down in my students' lives. I don't have to know all of it, because if I find out, I may have to act upon it, and people probably don't want that.

Taking an arrow to the knee

2012-01-04T04:52:00.000-08:00

My Skyrim days are over. After 16 hours of playing (spread over 2 weeks--I told you I wasn't much of a gamer!) and a paltry 6 achievements unlocked, I am officially retired. Real life has caught up with me, and while there are no frost trolls or dragons to be slain, there are theses groups to cattleprod and conference holds to breach. To my students, friends, and colleagues who have been so generous with their advice and guidance, thank you very much. It took a virtual village to raise this fledgling Dovahkiin and after all that mentorship she's still not sure she's getting all the spelling right. I imagine that, when summer rolls along, I will don my high elf persona and continue the journey. For now, though, I can say that I used to be an adventurer like you, but then I took an arrow to the knee.

The vacation I thought I'd have

2012-01-02T20:54:00.000-08:00

Today represents the vacation I thought I'd have: Sitting by my computer, editing student work, writing some of my own and prepping for class. For a myriad of reasons, the break was much, much busier and 70% of the busy-ness had nothing to do with work (good in some ways; bad in others).

Now that the break I thought I'd have is finally upon me, I feel like it's almost too late to savor it. We're back to school tomorrow. Why should I pre-emptively work today? With the remaining hours, maybe I should savor what's left of the non-work break. Maybe I should just watch all those TV episodes I'd been rationing. Maybe I should play a few more hours of Skyrim. Maybe I should bake or cook (cholesterol and sugar be damned). Maybe I should do just about anything other than work.

Cast of thousands

2012-01-02T14:23:00.000-08:00

A friend suggested that I took on too many thesis groups and advisees this year. In this friend's point of view, I wasn't able to supervise the groups enough. I am inclined to agree with the "too many" assessment, but my reasons for thinking so are different. In recent years, I've taken the position that I will only work with people who are working on affect and learning (or games). This is not meant to be a commentary on the thesis-worthiness of students' ideas. This is a commentary on my limits as a human being: I only have so much time, energy and attention to spare. It isn't possible for me to supervise too much diversity.

Everyone who is working with me is working on affect and learning (or games). However, there's still too much diversity. In retrospect, there are topics under me that could very well be supervised by the other faculty. Some of the topics just needed access to data or equipment, but the groups didn't really need *me* as an adviser. My aim is and has always been to deepen the research that we're doing. This year, we broadened it instead. This isn't a bad thing, but it doesn't really get us as far ahead as I would like.

For next school year, I have to narrow my focus even further. I should work with fewer people and be more selective about whom I will supervise.

Wants and needs

2011-12-31T03:57:00.000-08:00

I know of a woman much older than myself who was given a very unusual birthday gift. She was offered a non-trivial but not lifechanging amount of money on the condition that she spent it on herself.

This woman is a private citizen with no government ties or connections. She is professionally successful. She is in good health. All her basic needs are well covered. If she had to spend on herself, she would have to do so on luxuries. However, she is not a luxury sort of gal. She likes to be comfortable, but you'll never find her shopping in Greenbelt 5, for example. She's actually quite frugal.

Feeling that she didn't need anything for herself that she couldn't already afford, she ended up turning down the gift (to the shock and horror of her family and friends who were more than willing to help her look for creative ways to spend the money).

What would I do in her place? Each one of us has a list of must-haves and the nice-to-haves. My list of nice-to-haves is pretty long. I am fully aware that each and every item on that list is self-indulgent and unnecessary, but if I *had* to spend the money anyway, yeah, I could wipe it out easily by working on that list.

Honestly, though, I don't think I'd be that self-indulgent. In that situation, I'd probably try to be a little pilosopo. There's another list--let's call it the "man for others" list. Given the constraint that I would have to spend on myself, I would probably enter into an off-setting kind of arrangement: I'd have the gift pay for my basic needs, while I use my basic needs budget for "man for other" stuff. Probably. Assuming I could get away with it.

I think about this woman's situation. It's such an unusual problem. It reminded me of the movie Brewsters Millions. I don't know how I would feel in her shoes. Right now, I'm just having fun fantasizing about what I might do if I were.

Classic con

2011-12-30T15:05:00.000-08:00

There's a classic con that goes like this: Someone calls your house and tells your helpers that you have been in an accident. The caller orders the helpers to meet him/her at destination X, with the cash and jewelry from the house. If the helpers believe the caller, they gather up the articles and rush to the destination. Upon arrival, the caller takes the articles and tells them to wait. The caller leaves and never comes back.

There's at least one member of my family, my first-cousin, who has fallen victim to this scam. Just a few days ago, someone tried to pull the same stunt on my own household. Fortunately, our helpers knew about my cousin's experience. They hung up on the caller and tracked us down to let us know what happened.

No one was hurt. Nothing was stolen. Still, we feel disturbed that someone had tested us for vulnerabilities.

To our friends and family, be safe in 2012.

Blood test

2011-12-29T23:38:00.000-08:00

Because I've never "failed" a blood test in my life, I decided to have a full blood workup two days after Christmas. What a mistake. The tests showed that my HDL and fasting blood sugar levels were above the normal range. Given the timing, the results should not have surprised me. They disturbed me, though, enough to start amending my diet.

Lowering the cholesterol is a novice task. There are things I did this Christmas season that no mere mortal should ever do, e.g. have lechon five days in a row. You don't need a blood test to tell you that that is bad, very, very bad. So less lechon in my life, check.

What challenges me is the sugar. I'm not big on sweets to start. I will take the *occasional* cookie, a slice of cake, or piece of chocolate. However, one piece is usually enough. I have students who can wipe out a whole bag of chocnut in one sitting and that's something I cannot do. I couldn't figure out where the sugar was coming from, until Redg said "Carbs!"

That was sad news because I loooovvveee carbs. Rice. Potatoes. Corn. Yum. And to have to reduce the amount of carbs in my life, argh, that for me is harder than giving up lechon.

The suggestion from my doctor was to adjust my diet for about a month and then repeat the blood test. With any luck, my readings will go back to normal by then.

Mentorship

2011-12-23T13:48:00.001-08:00

One of the values that the Ateneo nurtures is mentorship. The senior faculty in particular are strongly encouraged to be mentors to the younger faculty as well as to students. We are expected to guide their research, to help them with classroom management, to vet course contents, and to provide other forms of support as requested.

Because I am already senior faculty, I'm used to being a mentor rather than a mentee. I have mentors of my own, some within the Ateneo, many more outside--people in my life with persistent, lasting influences on my direction and conduct. Mostly, though, when you get to my age, the usual case is for people to come to you for advice and not the other way around.

Enter Skyrim.

I mentioned that I'm not much of a gamer. This is the first RPG I've played in 5 years. I make a lot of mistakes, I have a lot of questions and I don't always have the patience to find stuff out on my own. Many of my recent Facebook wall posts start off with "Skyrim question:" followed by "How the heck do I do..." Fortunately, my current and former students (and one or two colleague) have all the answers. I think it's adorable that so many people are willing to give advice. I read all the solutions and try them out the next day. Mostly I still fail--sigh--which reflects on my skills (or lack thereof) as a gamer, and not on the advice. To my mentors, I am truly grateful. Thank you for your patience. We still have a long way to go.

The good news and the bad news

2011-12-23T00:52:00.000-08:00

Dr. Raffy Saldana, site director of the ACM ICPC Manila Regionals, posted the updated scoreboard on his website. The bad news is that we are no longer in the top 10. The good news is that six out of the 9 teams increased in ranking.

In summary:

#13 Ambo's Disciples (Janssen Go, Vernon Gutierrez, Jay Saringan) - 4 solved; up from #15 with 3 solved
#15 Die Potato = Ateneo de Manila University (Raf Anson, Enzo Dayrit and Leland Suarez) - 4 solved; down from #8 with 5 solved
#16 Redwire (Robin Anupol, Mark Tan, Daniel Fordan) - 3 solved; up from #20 with 2 solved
#23 Eser (Jazz Eser, Ia Cabatbat, Oscar Silva) - 2 solved; down from 14 with 3 solved
#26 Cantina? (Gabo Santos, Jansen Ignacio, Aaron Ong) - 2 solved; up from 32 with 1 solved
#29 1000% Fabulous (Camille Ruiz, Hans Chua, Michelle Villanueva) - 2 solved; up from 44 with 1 solved
#31 RMF (Ria Tecson, Marlou Ramas, Francis Macam) - 2 solved; up from 37 with 1 solved
#33 b.add(s); (Gabby Sanchez, Amiel Reviche, Charlene Tolentino; all-freshman team) - 2 solved; up from 45 with 1 solved
#41 Zartyse (Jayzon Ty, Nino Salazar, Jonathan Sescon) - 1 solved; down from 35 with 1 solved.

UP had 2 teams in the top 10, 3 teams in the top 15 and 5 teams in the top 20. ADMU had 2 teams in the top 15 and 3 teams in the top 20. Only three Philippine schools made it to top 20--UP, ADMU and ADNU.

Thank you again to everyone who made this year possible. We should all start planning for 2012.

The case of the missing memory

2011-12-19T14:27:00.000-08:00

A few days ago, I asked my driver to make a deposit for me. The following day, I asked him for the bank receipt. He told me that he had handed me the receipt when we were in the car on the way home the previous evening. I checked my wallet and sure enough the receipt was right there. The scary thing is that I had zero recollection of ever receiving the receipt from him. I don't even recall him handing me anything in the car.

If this were the only incident this season, it wouldn't bother me, but over the last few days, I've been slipping. I referred to the JDK as an SDK. I sent the wrong dates to a travel agent. I was asked several times: ARE YOU SURE about the dates? I said yes, I'm sure (this, despite the fact that my to-do list had the correct dates written in black-and-white. Taken in isolation, these incidents are nothing, but when they happen in rapid succession, they make you ask, what's happening to me?

I've known myself to go through occasional bouts of forgetfulness. The last time this happened wholesale was just when I assumed office at OIR. My goal at some point was to get through one day without forgetting anything. Admittedly, the past few days have been at the heightened levels of crazy that you'd expect from the Christmas season. It could be that these "senior moments" are the result of having too much on my mind.

What makes the situation ominous for me, though, is that the maternal side of my family has a history of dementia (yes, that explains a lot, doesn't it?). Back in the late 1970s and early 1980's, my grandmother had all the usual symptoms of Alzheimer's, though she was never formally diagnosed. In recent years, my own mom was diagnosed as having had a series of small strokes that have led to mild cognitive impairment. The behavioral result is she is very forgetful.

Because these chronic conditions take place over months or years, it's easy to rationalize them away by saying, oh, I've just been so busy. Eventually, they become harder to ignore.

The effect on me is that each slip scares me a little. A pattern of slips? That has me shaken.

Fortunately, there's enough awareness of these conditions to focus energies on prevention and coping. My to-do list is essential. A healthy diet and regular exercise are good for just about everything, including memory. Keeping mentally and socially active are good, too. A support system helps you cope and I am blessed to have people in my life who have my back, who point out the slips in the gentlest of ways. Assuming the conclusion is inevitable (and I don't believe it is), my goal is to reach it as gracefully and with as much dignity as possible.

All I want for Christmas

2011-12-18T23:40:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm really thinking of 2012, in the context of ALLS. There are a number of research projects under the ALLS umbrella that I would like to see come off the ground.

There's more novice programmer data, this time from Scheme, that needs to be analyzed.

There's a new toy coming. Some of you already know what it is. I'd like to see more affect-sensitive apps built using it along side some of our other, older toys.

The EDM workbench has to keep moving forward.

I'd like to see if we can incorporate some of the Bayesian Knowledge Tracing logic in the Aplusix data. I realize the features from Aplusix are different from those of the Cognitive Tutor, but perhaps there's a way to reinterpret the data using the BKT framework. Once that's done, of course, the agent's logic has to be updated and re-tested.

I'm going to need my usual a cast of thousands to get this done. There are some people already working with me this year who are likely to continue working with me next year. I'm losing most of my minions, er, students to graduation, and there's no telling whether there is a next wave coming to fill the spots they left behind.

Party like it's 2011

2011-12-18T03:12:00.000-08:00

When I was growing up, I used to join my parents on many of the gatherings they would attend during the Christmas season. By the time I had a social life of my own, there were years when I'd be out every night for about a month. By the end of the Christmas season, I'd be sick as dog with either a fever or asthma or food poisoning or something.

Eventually, I was sick of getting sick, and it was time to dial back. Over the last few years I've attended maybe 2 or 3 parties per season. Then 2011 rolled along and it's been a banner year for parties (at least in my life). Admittedly, some of them are work-related--the ALLS party, the DISCS party, the ACM party--but a few have been purely social. For instance, last night I attended the Mozu party, where Socorro and Redg were judges at a costume competition.

It's been fun, but Christmas is still a week away and I have already gotten a bad cold, asthma, and food poisoning. The irony is that we haven't been able to get together with certain close, close friends. If 2012 permits, I'm dialing back again.

Time, be my friend

2011-12-16T16:30:00.000-08:00

I was reviewing my to-do list for the break. It includes fun family-and-friends stuff, some travel, some entertainment (read: TV, movies and Skyrim), but it also includes some work that needs silence, concentration and lots and lots of time. I was actually hoping for some hours with nothing to do except stare out into space, feeling my brain rot. I don't think I will have that luxury, though.

A boy you should date

2011-12-13T15:45:00.000-08:00

Date a boy who gardens. Date a boy who spends his money on plants of all kinds instead of fancy cars and expensive watches. Date a boy who knows exactly how much water a bromeliad or a pot of rosemary needs, what plant will thrive in a spot that gets afternoon shade, and which ones glory in the full sun.

Date a boy whose garden is perfect for quiet meditation, a place where you can stare out into space for hours, or somewhere you can sit hand-in-hand, talking about nothing in particular.

This boy knows about patience. He knows that it takes time for plants to mature. He selects plans when they are young, so they can establish themselves in the environment, and gives them the years they need to grow.

He knows how to nurture living things. He fertilizes. He waters. He weeds. He prunes. He controls what he can of the environment so his plants can be at their best.

He also knows that there are things beyond his control. When a storm snaps off tree tops and flattens shrubs, when floodwater overruns ponds and entangles hedges with garbage and debris, he mourns the loving care destroyed in minutes. Afterwards, he clears the damage and starts imagining the garden's next, new look. This boy knows how to accept and recover from loss.

He recognizes beauty in its many forms. The sweeping grace of a palm tree. The densely-packed leaves of a ficus. The elegance of a vanda. From the precision topiaries of formal British gardens to alaga-ng-Diyos hills and mountainsides--his appreciation is unreserved.

And when the day comes that he sees the beauty in you, marry him.

FAQs about Skyrim and me

2011-12-13T03:36:00.000-08:00

Q: What race are you?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How many dragons have you slain?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How many quests have you completed?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How do you find it so far?
A: I have not yet started playing.

There's a reality TV show to be made from this.

Overparenting

2011-12-12T19:45:00.000-08:00

As parents, we want our children to be capable of living independently. We want them to be able to regulate their own work habits, find their own jobs, earn their own money, run their own household, and all-in-all solve their own problems without us coming to the rescue. Yet it's hard to see our children as becoming more and more capable and, perhaps, harder still, to accept that we aren't (as) needed anymore. There is, therefore, a temptation to meddle, under the guise of "staying involved."

Overparenting doesn't always help, though, because the truth is overparenting elders tend to see what their children as the children they ought to be and not the people they are. Years ago, there was a girl who was leaving Ateneo because of an academic deficiency. Her father and grandfather came to see me to ask what could be done. I said that I was sorry but it was too late. The grandfather went on and on about how well he knew the girl and how certain she was that she would, if given the chance, recover from her academic failures and continue her Ateneo life as a stellar student. As the grandfather spoke, my eyes were only on the girl. She sat in silence, alternately rolling her eyes and scowling. When the grandfather was done, I asked her, "Where are YOU in all this?" She didn't answer. My sense was she resented the grandfather's claim that he knew are at all and just wanted to be left alone.

My suggestion: Stay in touch with your kids.

December mode

2011-12-07T23:08:00.000-08:00

One of my colleagues was complaining that the students are already in December mode. They stare at him glassy-eyed and, if he asks a question, all he gets in reply are blank stares that say, "Duh?" I understand. Teaching, to some extent, gives you the same circadian rhythm as students. Like our students, we, the faculty, look forward to summer vacations, sem breaks, Christmas breaks and all those other in-betweens that people in corporate life do not enjoy. Admittedly, we use the breaks to catch up with work (as our students do), but we do also give ourselves time for family, friends, and otherwise being cognitively comatose. With about 10 days to go before the break begins, I can already feel my neurons blinking out one by one and it's taking more and more energy to keep them active. Soon, soon, I promise myself, you'll be able to leave this behind and focus all your time and energy on Skyrim. I claim this is for research.

A better person

2011-12-07T21:52:00.000-08:00

A quote attributed to Fr. Dacanay is, "The best way to find out whether you are in a genuinely loving relationship is to ask, Am I becoming a better person?" Fr. Dacanay, in his wisdom, chose the word "better" as opposed to "happier." To be the better person is to be kinder, gentler, more forbearing, more forgiving, more generous, more loving, none of which are concomitant with pleasure or freedom from pain. The happiness that comes with being the better person is sometimes akin to what Sirius Black must have felt in Azkaban--the cold comfort of knowing that you are doing the right thing.

What do you do for an encore?

2011-12-06T19:33:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in a previous blog post that I started the cottage industry that is my research area without a grand plan or vision in mind. I aimed for the low-lying fruit, did what I could with the resources I had, and never really thought too much about what happened next or where it was all going.

Despite a lack of vision, the group has done pretty well. 2011 has been especially good to us, ending with the conferment of the two CHED Best Higher Education Institution Research Program awards.

In the silence that follows, I find myself wondering: What now? What do we do for an encore? I refer not to awards but to the work in general. Over the last five years, I've done what interested me and I've let the awards come if they come. Am I missing an opportunity, though? Is there a big picture I'm not seeing or considering? Should I be acting with a little more direction, beyond the next research grant? One of the other candidates for the awards was given the opportunity to describe their project. It was a multi-million dollar project investigating poverty in different countries--just the sort of thing that could make me feel horribly self-indulgent.

How do we level up? What *is* the next level up? Something to think about.

The right stuff

2011-12-03T01:57:00.000-08:00

During my tenure as Chair, my main role at the ICPC was to make resources available to our competitive programming teams. Doc Mana took care of the coaching. Grace and Lisa took care of the other details. In the lull that followed, I became a spectator. I checked the scoreboard or else texted the coaches for our standing. My heart rose with every point gained and fell for every position dropped.

This year, I got very heavily involved, more involved than ever before. Aside from mustering resources, I also handled some of the Lite coaching, the food-and-drink prep, transportation, and using my special ability to get in people's faces when it counted. Working this closely with the teams makes you reflect on what it takes to excel in a competition of this nature.

Programming skills are a given. You should be way past making fencepost errors to even try your hand at competition. To be fielded for competition, you should be struggling with the problem, not the programming. The programming should be like breathing.

Still, programming skills are not enough. You need to have rapport with your team mates. You have to understand each other's strengths and capitalize on them. There's no room for infighting, not if you want to win. If there's no chemistry in the group, the solution is to either work it out or change group altogether.

You need to be willing to put in practice time. You have to take the training seriously. You can't be lazy. Yes, this costs you hours with friends, playing Monopoly Deal or Skyrim. Into each life a little rain must fall.

You need the right attitude. You have to want to win. True, there are teams we field for the experience--the younger, less mature teams. After a year or two of playing for experience, it's time to kick butt in a major way. You have to be resilient in the face of failure. You can't be easily discouraged. The problems are hard. You can't fold just because you don't understand them at the first read. You won't always come out on top. There will always be some up-and-coming young'un who will school you in ways you never thought you could be schooled. When this happens, you can't lose focus, you can't lose faith. You have to keep going. Finally, problem solving needs to be intrinsically fun for you. If you find it boring or if you'd rather be doing something else, there's no point in you consuming team resources. Go where you're most happy. If, on the other hand, you get that endorphin high from when the judges respond "Yes", then you should embrace your nerd pride and invest your energies in becoming even better at this thing that you love doing.

If you have the right stuff, the rest is practice.

ACM ICPC

2011-12-02T23:57:00.000-08:00

And the results are in! The top 10 were:

1. Staff = University of Tokyo (8/10)
2. Quiwarriors3 = University of the Philippines, Diliman (7/10)
3. --(Q_Q)-- = National Taiwan University (7/10)
4. Quiwarriors1 = University of the Philippines, Diliman (7/10)
5. Saklar Lhompat = University of Indonesia (6/10)
6. STsky = Nanjing University of Science and Technology (6/10)
7. Ah Moo Wa Dee Jia La = National Chiao Tung University (6/10)
8. Die Potato = Ateneo de Manila University (Raf Anson, Enzo Dayrit and Leland Suarez; 5/10)
9. Shiningcarolinegotofree = National Cheng Kung University (5/10)
10. NPC = SungKyunKwan University (5/10)

Our other teams placed as follows:

#14 Eser (Jazz Eser, Ia Cabatbat, Oscar Silva; 3 solved)
#15 Ambo's Disciple (Janssen Go, Vernon Gutierrez, Jay Saringan; 3 solved)
#20 Redwire (Robin Anupol, Mark Tan, Daniel Fordan; 2 solved)
#32 Cantina (Gabo Santos, Jansen Ignacio, Aaron Ong; 1 solved)
#35 Zartyse (Jayzon Ty, Nino Salazar, Jonathan Sescon; 1 solved)
#37 RMF (Ria Tecson, Marlou Ramas, Francis Macam; 1 solved)
#44 1000% Fabulous (Camille Ruiz, Hans Chua, Michelle Villanueva; 1 solved)
#45 b.add(s); (Gabby Sanchez, Amiel Reviche, Charlene Tolentino; all-freshman team, 1 solved)

There were 72 teams participating in all. We had three teams in the top 15. So did UP (2, 4, and 12). All other teams in the top 15 were foreign. In the top 20 teams, UPD and ADMU had 4 teams each. Ateneo de Zamboanga placed #19. The other teams were foreign. In case anyone is wondering, DLSU's top team placed #23.

Based on my knowledge of the history of our ACM ICPC participation, this is our best showing since 2009. UP started overtaking us in 2008 and we've haven't gotten back on top since. We really should start thinking about how to change this situation.

However, before the afterglow fades, there are people whom I need to thank:

Thank you to our ACM ICPC Managers and Coaches: Pablo Manalastas, David Diy, Jessica O Sugay, John Paul Vergara, and Jon Fernandez!

Thank you to our support staff: Alipio Salvador Gabriel, John Paul Contillo, Elisa S. Agbay, Grace Berganio, Mark Bautista, Deni Jaramillo, Tristan Manalang, Carlo Sanchez, and Ronald Panergo!

Thank you to our alumni guest coaches: Jan Vincent Liwanag, Danna Aduna, Melody Kay Carolino, Rafael Liban, Thomas Dy, Wilhansen Li, Clifford Lim, Miguel Arguelles, Jino Noel and Akie Mejia!

Thank you to our sponsors, Chikka.com and the Philippine Coastal Storage and Pipeline Corporation!

Thank you to the DISCS faculty and the Ateneo de Manila community for all their encouragement!

Most of all, thank you to our teams for their brilliance, dedication and HEART!

Don't hate us cause we're beautiful

2011-12-01T20:35:00.001-08:00

During yesterday's ACM ICPC opening ceremonies, the Ateneo teams entered UP's Bahay Alumni flashing the awesome jackets from Chikka. Many other teams had uniform shirts, some of which had colorful, post-modern designs. The jackets, though, ah, those were attention-grabbing--royal blue, long-sleeved, sponsored, and SPARQCoded, we looked pretty bad-ass.

Dr. Saldana, the contest site director, wanted pictures by the team and by school. He called each team up on stage and asked them to remain onstage until a school's entire contingent was complete. Because we were the largest group, the stage filled slowly, until it was completely awash in royal blue. When it was time to take the school shot, the photographer, who took her job very seriously, was careful to arrange us so that we were tightly clustered and so that all faces were visible. This took a while, and each minute that passed made us stick out more and more.

After the opening ceremonies, it was time to move to Vidal Tan Hall for the practice contest. The organizers had arranged for a fleet of jeeps to take us from Bahay Alumni to Vidal Tan. We weren't told ahead of time that there was transportation available, so we, naturally, had our own caravan of vans and SUVs. As our teams walked down the steps, bypassing the contest-sponsored transportation, one of the boys said, "Siyempre, ang mga Atenista, hindi mag-je-jeep..." Hay, mga elitista. :)

I don't know if I was just being self-conscious, but my sense was there really was something flamboyant about the way we owned our space during this contest. Now if we actually owned the contest, we'd really have something. Three hours to go. In the meantime, don't hate us cause we're beautiful.

Playing the victim

2011-11-28T18:30:00.000-08:00

I generally I don't mind taking care of people and I don't mind people depending on me. However, there's a personality type that I don't like very much: the chronically needy.

They've forgotten something. They're missing something. They have to use something you have. Just for now. Just for a while. At first, this is not a problem. Who hasn't forgotten stuff at home? After a while, though, a pattern emerges. They seem to be in this perpetual state of emergency that needs your intervention or else they'll just curl up and die. The truth is, they aren't really helpless. They just want to use their neediness to get attention and affirmation. In some cases, neediness sparks a conversation. In other cases, it is the first move in seduction. In still other cases, the neediness is a way to get others to foot the bill that you don't want to pay, to conserve your own resources at other people's expense (literally). This works with a some people--those who need to be needed--because it makes them feel indispensible, as if someone's world turns on their say-so.

Chronic neediness doesn't work on me. On the contrary, it annoys me. I can generally tell when I'm being manipulated. There are times when it's fun, but mostly, you can sell your neediness to someone else who's buying. I admire capable people who exhaust their own resources before asking for help. When they do ask for help, I'm more than willing to lend a hand. It's these times when I really do think that I am needed.

The challenge of evaluation

2011-11-26T23:16:00.000-08:00

In Bloom's taxonomy, evaluation is the highest ordered thinking skill in the cognitive domain. If you want to assess how a person thinks or how much a person knows, ask him to grade a piece of work and explain how he arrived at the rating. You'll be able to tell from his evaluation if he thought deeply about the work, is widely read in the domain, is pushing an agenda or perspective, or is only fixated on grammar and formatting.

I'm very self-concious, therefore, when I am asked to review the work of other people for possible publication in a journal or inclusion in conference proceedings. Each review is a test. Although the author will probably never know who I am, the editor will, and he or she will see first hand just how brilliant or bobo I can be.

I therefore try (some times harder than others, admittedly) to comment about the work I'm given in layers. On the surface, I try to comment on grammar, format, and organization. Going slightly deeper, I comment on whether the literature cited is relevant, or if there are other works that might be more apt. I try to understand the design of experiments, and see if they are reasonable. If I'm feeling really macho, I try to comment on the data analysis treatments, to determine if they were executed correctly and evaluated using valid methods (this is the area in which I'm the least confident). Finally, I read the conclusions and decide whether it is fair for the authors to have drawn them.

Seeing as I have a system for reviewing, I wish I could say that all my reviews are brilliant and insightful. The fact is, though, that my reviews are still very much limited by my own knowledge base. There have been cases in which I've returned papers to editors, saying that I didn't have the qualifications to provide a credible review. I'm picky about what I'll read, and am becoming pickier as I age. The fear of making a fool out of myself is growing with time. I think that's precisely because, as you age, people have greater and greater expectations about the quality of your work, and if you fall below expectations, you are somehow ... diminished.

In the review process, it is not only the papers that are evaluated. So are the reviewers.

Another atmostphere of life

2011-11-25T20:28:00.000-08:00

My favorite part of the book "A Christmas Carol", Charles Dickens narrates how Scrooge's betrothed releases him from their promise to wed. The young woman, who is never named, perceived that he had sought release, "In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of life, another Hope as its great end. In everything that made my love of any worth or value in your sight." In other words, they grew apart.

I know how that feels. I has happened to me many times, not with betrotheds, but with friends in general. There are people with whom I've drifted apart. Why? Because they changed while I stayed pretty much the same. Or the other way around. Either way, none of the relationships ever ended with a great falling out. They fizzled slowly. We moved farther and farther away from each other until we weren't in each other's orbit anymore. Our spirits changed, our lives changed, and the love that once meant so much lost its worth and value.

Surrender

2011-11-22T08:52:00.000-08:00

Didn't I just say I wouldn't fill the voids with more work?! I never learn ... but I'm trying to amend my life, starting right now.

It's nearly 1 am and I'm still up. Up to about 15 minutes ago, I was reading literature, trying to put together a grant proposal that could bring in some international funding. However, the deadline is seven days away. If this were all I had on my plate, yes, I would go for it. However, there are other things--some work, some personal--that are important and need attention, too.

Furthermore, there are two existing grants that need closer supervision. We're in the tail end of preparing accounting reports, for instance. I generally like straightening out the books, but it is time-consuming, tedious, detailed work that needs many iterations to get right. There are field trials to conduct. There's an analysis that needs to be conducted. About 15 minutes ago, I realized that I am approaching my limits. I no longer have the absorptive capacity to take on yet another grant (well, maybe if I gave up other time sinks like sleeping, diving, and spending time with my family...).

It was at that point when I told myself to give up already. Know when you're beaten. Back away. Live to fight another day.

I surrender. Good night.

The elements of a healthy educational environment

2011-11-22T08:26:00.000-08:00

I was showing my class a video this evening in which the London Knowledge Lab's Professor Richard Noss enumerated the elements of a healthy educational environment: A teacher doing interesting things, a challenging activity, and peers with whom one can discuss. I'm finding that the elements for a healthy research environment are quite similar. You need, perhaps not a teacher, but a goal that is interesting. You need challenging activities. You need peers with whom you can discuss.

Boys are different

2011-11-19T22:32:00.000-08:00

Because I have only ever had to take care of a girl, I naturally assume that children survive by aborbing nutrients from the air. Socorro can eat a lot, but mostly her meals are small and (sigh) very healthy.

Taking care of ProgVar, a male-dominated enterprise, has shifted my world view. Boys eat. A LOT. If you buy jumbo siopaos, for example, make sure you buy two per person. The empanadas of Banapple, the ones as big as a plate? 1.5 per person. One of our boys who also happens to be on our varsity judo team, can tuck away four helpings of barbecued ribs. Oh, and for the healthy eaters, make sure there's fruit and yoghurt.

The injustice of it all is that most of our ProgVar boys are thin or fit or both. They don't look like they eat very much, but this is a classic case of looks being deceiving.

I say all this without malice. It's actually fun to see our kids eat. It is certainly far more fulfilling than seeing food left on the table, untouched. From an anthropological sense, it's interesting to observe this dimension of the sexes--the differences in the way they feed. The conclusion? Boys and girls are different.

The path of most resistance

2011-11-19T03:53:00.000-08:00

In Anilao today, the water was like glass. The sun was out. The winds were calm. It was the sort of day that inspired even landlubbers like me to venture into new territory. I told the divemaster: Let's go to Mainit!

Mainit was advertised as having strong current. It also reputedly has a shark cave. Yes, I was feeling macho today.

So off we went. The banca cut through the water without the slightest bounce--the ride was smoother than an SUV on EDSA. Then, we turned the corner and OMG where the hell did the chop come from?! The surface was exactly the sort of surface I DO NOT like to dive in because it threatens to bring the katig down on your head like the Mighty Hammer of Thor.

Then, we had an equipment failure. One of Socorro's regs was leaking.

My daughter, who is always, always more sensible than I suggested we head back. The divemaster suggested to just unscrew the leaky reg, plug the outlet and use the "octopus"--the emergency reg that your buddy would use to share your tank if he/she ran out of air.

The dive master wasn't worried, so I wasn't worried. I swapped BCD and reg with Socorro and we proceeded with the dive.

The dive would have been worthwhile if the viz was any good. Unfortunately, it was comparable to miso soup. There were lots of fish but the colors were all muted, even close to the surface. We got out of the water, still amidst all the waves, about 40 minutes later.

Immediately after turning the corner, we were again in glass-smooth surface. I berated myself, what were you thinking?!

Our second dive was at Cathedral, a stone's throw from the resort. I wanted to feed the fishes again. If you ever want a sim of being attacked by piranhas, feed the fish in open water. Make sure you wear gloves. It was fun, though, something that I would do again.

The first dive and the equipment failure notwithstanding, I was glad we were able to dive today. With December and all its complexities looming towards us, this is likely to be our last dive of the year. I will be more sane next time.

I would like to thank the academy...

2011-11-15T15:23:00.000-08:00

The presentation I'm scheduled to give on December 2 is supposed to be technical. The spotlight is on the research and the institution. I don't get to make an Oscar-like acceptance speech in a tremulous voice as someone fixes my tiara and hands me a bouquet.

That's what blogs are for.

This research group began at a time when I was actually thinking of leaving the Ateneo. Life on the hill was confusing at the time. My term as Chair was ending. The reviews about my aptitude as an administrator were mixed. I loved teaching but I'd always felt like a bit of a fraud if I taught from the book. I needed to teach from experience, and my well experience was running dry. There was a strong urging from the higher admin to form research groups, but the culture of research young and still finding its legs. Mentors were hard to come by, especially in my field, this bastard child of computer science and education. I thought that maybe it was time to leave the safe harbour of academia and go back out into the real world where I might find more clarity.

I made a last attempt at establishing a homestead. I deliberately looked for a topic that brought together hard computer science and education. I looked for collaborators. I had my grad classes do little experiments. I submitted a few grant proposals. I wish I could say that I had some great vision, some grand design or architecture in mind when all this began, but the truth is I felt like I was setting up a sari-sari store, as opposed to Trinoma. In the early years, I never knew what the next study would be, who would do the work, or where we would publish. There was no plan, no strategy, no MVO. I did the work that was convenient, aiming for the low-lying fruit, with the people I had.

And I didn't have many people--no one permanent, in any case. My teams were always ad hoc, made up of whoever was willing and able. I would always say that working with me is not marriage: It's just coffee. We do one project and then we're done. We part as friends. No one is obliged to stay on.

I did have several things going for me, though. First was that I had (and have) world-class collaborators, foremost of whom is Ryan Baker. If there is one person who deserves the most credit for dragging the work onto the world stage, it is him, and I cannot thank him enough. My other collaborators--Art Graesser, Sidney D'Mello, Matt Jadud, Jean-Francois Nicaud, Genaro Rebolledo-Mendez, Noboru Matsuda, Andrew Junker, Tanja Mitrovic, Kathi Fisler, Guillaume Marceau and many, many others--overwhelmed me with their generosity. They moved the work forward, enriched my options, wired me into the right networks. They gave the work scale as well as quality.

Second, I could write. I'm not winning any Nobels any time soon, mind you, but I can write well enough to put together an acceptable grant proposal, and get into journals and conferences--currency in this world.

Third, because I could write, I was able to get funding money. The Department of Science and Technology has been generous with its support. They've enabled us to hire talent and buy toys, and in this game, thems wid da most toys wins.

Finally, I had people who wanted to (or had to) work with me, for whatever reason. Some of them were the very best their batches had to offer. I won't attempt to name everyone because I'm likely to forget people and that would be bad. I will single out a couple of people, though. Jessica Sugay has backed me up since this liitle cottage industry began. I've learned so much for her about organizing the million million details that go into mounting a field study. Her OC-ness has been a model worth emulating. For this, she will always have my gratitude. The other person is Sweet San Pedro. Sweet only worked with me for maybe 18 months, but in that time she was everything that an adviser could hope for. She was (is) smart, independent, self-motivated. She has achieved the most stellar success I've ever had in my group--the publications, the PhD scholarship--and she's not slowing down. Sweet has set the bar, and it is high.

If someone had told me five years ago that we would win any prizes for our work, I don't think I would have believed them. I'm not the smartest person in my department and there are far sexier things going on in terms of research. I wasn't the first person in affective computing, computer-aided instruction, novice programmer studies, data mining or AI in this country. I wasn't even the first person in Ateneo who was into these things. What happened, though, was that they had moved on to other things, while I stayed and poured what time and energy I could into something that captured my interest, in the hope of making myself relevant to academia again, and making a life in academia meaningful to me.

To all of my companions who were and are the magic that turns what would otherwise be a highly personal journey into a truly institutional research program, my sincere and profound gratitude.

CHED BHEIRP

2011-11-15T15:17:00.000-08:00

FR. JOSE ROMAN T. VILLARIN, S. J.
President
Ateneo De Manila University
Katipunana Road, Loyola Heights
Quezon City

Dear Father Villarin,

The Commission on Higher Education - National Capital Region (CHEO-NCR) will conduct the 2010 Awarding Ceremony for the Best Higher Education Institution Research Program (BHEIRP). The National Evaluation Committee (NEC) confirmed Ateneo De Manila University, Quezon City as the NCRs' winning entry for the said research competition. Congratulations!

It is requested that a short 15 minutes power point preientation gf Ms. Ma. Mercedes T. Rodrigo entitled, "Affective Computing," be presented during the awarding ceremony to be held at the CHED becutive Lounge, 4th floor HEDC Bldg., C. P. Garcia Avenue, UP Diliman, Quezon City on December 2, 2011 at 10:00 0" clock in the morning.

We look forward to your favorable response. Please confinn acceptance to this invitation to Dr. Winefreda B. Asor at telephone numbers 441-12-24 and 441-04- 53.
Thank you.

Very truly yours,

CATHERINE Q. CASTANEDA, Ph. D.
Director IV

Wardrobe gaps

2011-11-15T12:59:00.000-08:00

My wardrobe is all wrong now. Because of the years in OIR, I accumulated lots of business attire--tailored skirts, suits, dresses and lots and lots of heels. I tell my HCI classes that the products we use say something about ourselves. These clothes and shoes are so me. Their things I love to wear. The problems is that they're a bit much for teaching class and working in the lab. The adjustment in workload prompts an adjustment in wardrobe.

For example, I have almost no decent shoes I can wear with jeans. I have rubber shoes, yes, and I have slippers. I have one old, ratty pair of moccasins that are begging to be euthanized. I do have two pairs of toweringly high heels that can dress up a pair of denims, if that's where I was going, but they are both "one hour shoes". Years ago, I used to have lots of booties, flats and otherwise sensible but still dressy walking shoes. I don't anymore.

Most of my days in OIR were spent in skirts. I can, of course, continue to wear my skirts, but then I go back to needing lower heels if not flats to dress them down a bit.

(A conio-to-the-max friend of mine had an expression: Konti nalang my shoesies.)

I need more slacks, in general.

It's time to go shopping.

Lifestyle changes

2011-11-14T17:39:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, Redg gave me the Christmas gift I wanted: an MP3 player that I can wear under water. It's only good up to 3 meters, so it isn't meant for diving, just lapping. Today, for the first time in many, many years, I took an early morning swim. The added accessory worked out beautifully. Time went by very quickly and I felt great after. I got to work by 9ish. Since I have class up to 9 pm tonight, I'm still putting in a 12 hour day.

Now that I no longer have an admin load, it's time to live as if there are more hours in the day. I'm challenging myself not to replace the time I've freed up with more work, but rather with more of the things I didn't have time to do.

Everything she wanted

2011-11-11T17:11:00.000-08:00

She didn't dream of falling in love. She didn't hope that someone who would hold her hand during movies or take her on romantic dinners. She was too mature to indulge in fantasies of sunset walks by the beach, of long conversations about nothing in particular, of an arm wrapped around her shoulders, accompanied by a gentle kiss and nuzzle.

She was too grounded to believe in soulmates. This was a little girl concept after all. That there was someone out there who "completed you" in ways that you couldn't complete yourself seemed self-indulgent and unnecessary. Genuine companionship, a sincere interest in the other, the spontaneous joy that comes with being with the right person--chalk those up to pulp fiction romances.

She wasn't even open to friendship. Men and women couldn't be friends. God didn't make them that way. Any man who even looked at a woman only wanted one thing, and any man who said otherwise was a liar. There were no platonic relationships, not between the sexes.

She had resigned that she would never get married, and if she did, wasn't looking to be smitten when it happened. Emotions blur judgment and she wanted her judgment to be as sound as possible for a decision as critical as this. She had a job description for the good husband: a good provider, faithful, reasonably kind, solid, conservative Christian values. If he would play the good husband, she would play the good wife: hostess, home economist, housekeeper, personal shopper, personal assistant, date. She wasn't looking, though. Then, he came into her life, this marriable man who fit the bill, and so they wed.

The good news is that she got everything she wanted, which in the grand scheme of things, leaves her better off than most.

How to be intimidating without really trying

2011-11-10T15:16:00.000-08:00

Day 1 of class. I made a grad student cry.

Day 2 of class. I was scheduled to work with Deni Jaramillo, one of our technicians, on the installation of a new data collection server. When I walked into the work room, Deni was helping a new faculty member set up her Moodle account. I waited until they looked like they were done before I started talking to Deni. When Deni's and my conversation began, I noticed that the faculty member wasn't leaving. I thought, oh, dear, did I just cut in line? So, I turned to her and asked in what I thought was a friendly tone, "Was there anything else you needed?"

It turned out, she was just checking her phone. She replied, "No, no..." and then scurried away.

Later that day, her younger sister, who turned out to be a former student of mine, came up to me laughing. I scared her Ate, she said.

Sorry, sorry! I didn't mean to be intimidating. It's a gift.

He knows me so well.

2011-11-05T15:16:00.001-07:00

Last night, we had dinner with some long-time friends. The conversation drifted to the end of my term at OIR. They were happy to hear that I was back to being full-time faculty because this mean that we could probably dive together more often. :)

One of my female friends asked Redg whether I was tired of all the traveling. Redg explained that the travel not unpleasant for me at all. It was tiring, true, but not unpleasant. In fact, he said, the job on the whole was fine. He said that I was just eager to devote more attention to my research.

Ladies, when a man knows you this well, MARRY HIM!

Solo flight

2011-11-05T02:29:00.000-07:00

One of my grad students wrote me a note asking if she could finish and defend her proposal this semester. I replied that only she could answer that question. Whether or not she finishes is up to her, not me. If she works on the thesis, it'll get done, but it isn't for me to say whether she will work on it or not.

A thesis is a solo flight. With all due respect to mentors and support staff, the ultimate success or failure of a thesis is determined by the student and no one else. No one else can do it for you. No one else can save you.

Tie a yellow ribbon

2011-11-02T23:06:00.000-07:00

2 November 2011

MEMO TO : The University Community
FROM : The President
SUBJECT : Appointment of Glenn F. De Leon as Officer-in-Charge of the Office of International Relations

I would like to inform the community of the appointment of Mr. Glenn F. De Leon as the Officer-in-Charge of the Office of International Relations (OIR) for the period November 2, 2011 to March 20, 2012.

Dr. Ma. Mercedes T. Rodrigo was originally scheduled to take her sabbatical leave in the second semester of this school year. However, in response to an urgent need by the Department of Information Systems and Computer Science (DISCS), she has agreed to defer her sabbatical leave, and to return to teaching.

A Search process for the position of Director of the Office of International Relations will be in place beginning this month.

We wish to thank Mr. De Leon for graciously accepting this assignment. We also express our gratitude to Dr. Rodrigo for the invaluable service that she rendered further strengthening our internationalization efforts since May 1, 2009. We also appreciate her generosity in deferring her sabbatical leave in favor of serving her home Department.

Thank you.

JOSE RAMON T VILLARIN, SJ
President

Paradigm shift

2011-11-01T01:22:00.000-07:00

I decided not to go on the last two dives today. I couldn't tell if my cold was getting better or worse, and I wasn't willing to risk rupturing my eardrum or worse yet my lungs. I decided instead to snorkle with Redg while Socorro went down with the dive master and four other tourists. Now that I know how to dive, snorkling strikes me as strangely non-committal--bobbing on the surface with a minimum of gear, seeing whatever happens to be close. I sound like such a snob for saying that our loud, but it's amazing how acquiring new skills change attitudes.

I have a new found respect for my health, for example. Prior to diving, nothing I used to do required me to be in particularly good health. I taught a couple of classes with laryngitis. I didn't have to speak--I typed my most of lecture. When my fingers got tired, I squeaked into the ear of one of my students and asked him to echo what I said. Just recently, I gave a lecture without my glasses, pointing to what I hoped were relevant portions of the slide when necessary. I traveled to Japan on day 2 of dengue fever. I didn't know it was dengue at the time. I swam and continued to use my computer in the middle of nasty cold, giving myself a killer migraine that landed me in the hospital to rule out meningitis and an aneurysm. With the diving, though, I'm a lot more careful about watching out for colds, coughs or anything that might threaten my mortality, perhaps because what we're doing carries an inherent risk that leaves little room for bravado.

I've also discovered my inner beach bum. Well, maybe that's going to far. I still don't like getting sand on my skin. I'm still disgusted with the stickiness that comes with dips salt water. I hate that I feel like daing at the end of the day. And I still don't can't lounge for very long, just staring at the sea, gorgeous and infinite as it is at night under an equally gorgeous and infinite sky. Why? Because most of my forms of relaxation are doable at home--sleeping, eating, swimming (in fresh water!), getting a massage, watching TV. Diving has given me a something to do while at the beach. It has given me a purpose, a preoccupation, a reason to be somewhere other than home. As a long weekend approaches, I find myself contemplating, "Work or dive?"

When I decided to learn to dive last May, my goal was to rock my boat, to do something uncharacteristic, risky, new, to break out of comfortable patterns. These paradigm shifts are my indication that I've succeeded.

Diving with a cold

2011-10-31T02:18:00.000-07:00

Strictly speaking, you're not supposed to dive unless you're in the pink of health. Well, the month of October was such a bear for me, I suspected that I was going to get sick. I was hoping that I'd go down (if at all) after the Apo trip, but perhaps I fulfilled my own prophecy: I had a sore throat yesterday and the sniffles today.

The sore throat was didn't have much effect. The sniffles were a pain, though--literally. I felt as if I was about to bleed from my eyes at any moment. It went away, wish some effort. I'm signed up for two more dives tomorrow, but we'll see.

Apo Island

2011-10-30T02:12:00.000-07:00

Socorro and I just completed three dives at Apo Island. The ocean was like crystal. You could see "forever" even over 20 meters under water. We saw four turtles (or possibly the same turtle, four times), one sea snake, two very large bump head parrot fish, and a school of what looked like talakitok that had me thinking about lunch.

The most magical thing we saw, though, had nothing to do with fish or coral. During our third dive, the divemaster took us down in a sandy patch where thousands of streams of bubbles rose from the ocean floor. It was like swimming in a glass of champaign. You could feel the tickle of the bubbles as the ocean exhaled.

The experience was such a blessing, I need to thank the many people who made it possible. Thank you to Joy and Hernel Castillo of DiveNet for convincing us to take the Advanced Open Water Course. Everything you taught us, from the drift diving to the giant stride entry to the deep dives were used multiple times. Thank you to Lenard Berba for recommending the Thalatta Resort. It is very clean, very comfortable, the service is great, the food is delectible, and the diveshop is first-rate. Thank you to Luis and Jeanne Tan for their advice about what to look out for and for always putting safety first.

There's so much more to see.

The intimidating audience

2011-10-27T14:46:00.001-07:00

When I was in high school, we were taught about public speaking. One of the rules was to stare your audience down until they sat quietly and gaze at you with rapt attention, before you even utter your first word.

This is not a rule I follow. Ever.

I think that if people are interested, they will listen and if they're not, well, it's a free country. I will keep on talking whether or not people are listening, distracting as the noise may be. I bank on the audience to discipline itself, which is to say the intersted members of the audience will shush the noisier elements of the group. I don't believe I can force anyone to listen to me, especially because I know full well that the stuff I speak about simply isn't made for a general audience. Even among computer scientists and educators, my stuff doesn't appeal to everyone, and that's fair.

This is why I generally don't like speaking before large groups, and by large I mean more than 40 people. It's not because speaking befor large audiences intimidates me. It's because I know that I'd be lucky if 10% of the people in the room actually care about what I'm saying. I much prefer a small but interested group. Indeed, I am much more intimidated by a one-on-one conversation with an interested, informed second party than by an audience of indifferent thousands.

I suppose one can argue that I could stop speaking and wait until people are quiet, but that would kinda make me a quite the diva, and that thought intimidates me even more.

Desire over pain

2011-10-23T01:47:00.000-07:00

Friday morning marked the end of the Subic CodeOver, 4.5 days of back-to-back contests to prep for the upcoming contest season. Fr. Ben's pep talk to the basketball teams involved the phrase "desire over pain." Well, using number of curse words per unit time as a proxy indicator, the kids were in a lot of pain. I've heard "S**t, alam ko na!" from students before, but I don't think I've heard "f**k" and "Java" in the same sentence quite so many times, not to mention "p****g inang problem na yan!" Yes, pain there was, and plenty of it.

I've mentioned before that the ProgVar kids can trash talk among the best of them, and they did. When one team observed that they hadn't ranked first in any of the contests yet, another team replied, "Sige, pagbibigyan na namin kayo." When the freshmen schooled the upperclassmen, Jess yelled at a senior team "You're getting your a***s kicked!" Doc Mana commented, "The freshmen are slugging it out." One upplerclassman replied, "And we're d***ing around." The next day, I approached him and said, "Enough of the d***ing around. Tutoo na." Then, I went up to Vernon and said, "Vernon, stop making the freshies feel good about themselves!" Vernon nodded, "Serious na."

But there was also camaraderie. During the last breakfast, the upperclassmen expressed sincere admiration for the freshmen and how well they held up. I believe I heard Vernon say to Gabby, "You're better than we were as freshmen." That was a huge thing to say.

Last week, for the most part, desire won over pain. Did we do enough to win? I hope so, but God knows. Whatever happens, we are better for the experience.

Time for parent involvement?

2011-10-19T18:33:00.000-07:00

Is it time to mobilize our students' parents in the care and feeding of ProgVar? I am half-kidding and half-serious when I ask this question. The half-kidding part comes from knowing that many of our students probably do not want their parents hovering over them during training. The half-serious part comes from knowing how much work goes into the logistics of the CodeOver, and the recognition of an opportunity for parents to see exactly what it is their kids do. How many parents would be up to the challenge, and out of that subset, how many kids would allow their parents to get involved?

Wake up calls

2011-10-18T18:37:00.000-07:00

This is day 3 of the ProgVar CodeOver and everyone is feeling a little fried. While most bounced out of bed yesterday, today was more of a struggle. To get them up:

* Their teammates dangled bacon in front of their noses.
* Other teammates said "You're running out of food!"
* I called out: "Contest begins in 15 minutes!" (And it did.)

To the teams' credit, they knew what they signed for. We didn't get a word of complaint.

When you speak of me...

2011-10-17T20:42:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, Student A mentioned Student B's name to me in a conversation. I could not remember Student B's face, so I asked, "Sino nga yon?" I was expecting an answer like, "The guy who sits in row X, beside Student C..." or similar information to help me triangulate. Instead, Student A replied, "Maam, yung guwapo." I laughed and said, "OK, that doesn't help."

Fast-forward to the present. I was telling this same story to another faculty member, within earshot of a male student. After I said that the descriptor "yung guwapo" didn't help, this student asked, "Was it me?"

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is called confidence.

End of season

2011-10-15T13:35:00.001-07:00

I have a friend who used to tell fortunes for a hobby. For fun, she told my fortune and among her predictions was that I was going abroad later that year. When I mentioned this to a mutual friend of ours, his reaction was, "You needed her to tell you that?" Fast forward 25 years later and I don't think either one of them saw my current travel schedule in the cards. I'm not breaking any records, mind you. I'm just logging a lot more miles per unit time than I thought I would ever would.

But this too shall pass. I just returned from a trip to Memphis, TN, marking the end of not just a season but (I hope) a pattern. While it wouldn't be healthy for me to be completely "grounded", the plan is to be more grounded than I am now. Why? Because many of the things that I want to do well are things that need sustained attention, and I can't devote that quality of attention if I keep having to flit in and out every month. Travel is good, but I do feel a need to settle down more.

How "supportive" looks

2011-10-11T08:51:00.000-07:00

"Supportive" does not mean agreeing to everything you want. "Supportive" means helping you arrive at your stated goals.

That isn't easy because you don't always have a clear perspective of what reaching that goal entails (for that matter, neither do I). There are details you miss--on scope, on methodological rigor or on theory. When I ask you to beef up these components, I'm not setting up roadblocks just to get my jollies. I'm asking you to save both yourself and me the shame that comes with a poorly designed study.

I ask you to check the literature to see what other people have tried. Find out what it is you may be able to borrow from their work. Try to identify the limitations of their studies. How will your study be different--or will it? In the course of reading past studies, I want you to think deeply about what you're doing. I do not want you to not barrel forward without knowing WHY THE HECK you are doing this (aside from wanting your degree).

I ask you to get visit and revisit your data gathering protocols if you're using human subjects. Make sure your data is gathered with integrity and is treated with confidentiality. Get permission from all the participants. If they are minors, make sure you get clearance from their parents. If your data isn't gathered properly, your ethics could be called into question later on. As an adviser, part of my job is to try to think of ways to bulletproof your study. I don't always succeed, but I try to catch what I can.

Sometimes "supportive" means telling you you're being an idiot. OK, so maybe I don't call you an idiot to your face. I tell you that you're contradicting yourself, that you haven't read enough, that you're being naive, that your assumptions are wrong or that your methods don't match your goals.

I get that all this seems "unsupportive" of me. Yes, why DON'T I just let you go off on your own, to do what you like, when you like, how you like? Because in science what you like doesn't really matter. There are rules. There are standards and protocols you have to respect. Making you aware of these rules is me being supportive. If you don't want this kind of support, just let me know and I can withdraw from your research altogether. That is how "unsupportive" would look.

Beso-beso

2011-10-08T22:16:00.000-07:00

One of my cousins-in-law, a caucasian American, was differentiating Filipino and American greetings. He noted that it wasn't usual for us to hug each other. It was more common to give each other a buzz on the cheek. When he hugs the Filipino relatives, he noticed that the hugs were hurried. People wrap their arms around him and then immediately let go without a pause. American hugs linger for a one breath, or longer if the friend or relative in your arms is cherished or missed.

Every culture has a different way of greeting. The Germans love to shake hands. The Japanese bow. The French kiss on the cheek twice, sometimes four times. The Americans hug. The point is to adapt to the context.

Going somewhere?

2011-10-08T14:31:00.000-07:00

Ryan Baker, a research colleague and friend, extended a very kind invitation to me to spend (part of) my sabbatical in his lab in Worcester Polytechnic. Unfortunately, my sabbatical already begins in November (at least that's the plan) and I've already mapped out some plans that include staying grounded for most of the second semester. The good news is that Ryan's time window is large. I can make plans for up to three years from now, and that's just given his current set of grants. I promised I would discuss the matter with Redg and Socorro and make plans for a visit, whenever that may be.

At the moment, I'm a little tired. The first semester tends to be travel-heavy because both the OIR and my own research area's conference seasons overlap. I heard that an American man recently clocked 10 million actual miles traveled (earning him 50 million redeemable miles). I don't envy him at all.

When the tiredness passes, though, I know I will have to plan out that research visit. You would think that in this day of connectivity distance wouldn't be a factor. Whether I am here or there, I should be able to do the work, right? To that, I say that there's value in immersion. Living in the research culture, collaborating with other people whose sole focus is research and getting to learn about what they are doing, which tends to be very different from what you're doing, ups your game like nothing else can. You come back knowing so much more. I come back feeling as if I've renewed my license to teach and mentor my students because--HA!--I genuinely know more than they do.

The related thought is that I wish I could bring more people with me. I have some people in mind, some very, very good students whom I think would benefit tremendously from the exposure. We shall see, though, because that's another layer of complexity. For now, what's sure is that I will plan a visit. When and with whom, we shall see.

Performance orientation

2011-10-06T16:09:00.001-07:00

A young, brilliant researcher whose work I admire shattered my world view when he told me that he was a very performance-oriented person. YOU?! I gaped. In what universe?!??

I am! he said.

No way, I objected. He publishes often and very well. How could that be performance-orientation?

Well, he said, you know, racking up the publications is like racking up points. You just want to keep on publishing. Every time you do, it's like, score one for me!

Performance orientation is one side of goal orientation, which is a theory of human beings' motivation to learn. Performance orientation refers to being motivated by external measures of success--grades, praise from teachers, academic prizes, and so on. The other side, mastery orientation, refers to motivation to learn for the love of learning or out of a genuine interest in the discipline.

It stunned me to think that this young man could label himself performance-oriented when he exceeds most external measures of excellence. People look up to him as an expert in his area. He's driven, focused, and very hard working (though he labels himself lazy). How is that performance orientation?

In an attempt view things with his lens, I had to admit that all of us in the publish-or-perish game have to be a little performance oriented, right? We're all racking up conference papers and journal articles. We're all checking to see how many cites we've received. We're all gunning for more grant money and we aren't always doing it because what we're doing is our favorite thing EVER. Sometimes, you just want that extra notch on your belt, or the opportunity to bask in your smugness and say "F*** yeah!". At our age and despite all our accomplishments, could it be that our sense of self-worth and accomplishment still boils down to grades?

In the middle of my rumination, the young man wakes me and says, But the most effective way to achieve performance goals is to be mastery-oriented. Oh crap. I think I need a new motivational theory.

Backing away from hell

2011-10-06T04:52:00.000-07:00

Who knew Princess Leia could be such a comic? I watched a video of Carrie Fisher's one-woman show entitled, "Wishful Drinking." It was an autobiographical tale of depression and substance abuse, of failed love and newfound hope, repackaged with wit and intelligence into a self-deprecating sketch of a life too bizarre and extreme for anyone to have invented. Her life is funny! Because, as she put it, if it weren't funny, it would just be true.

Even for those of us who've never become science fiction movie icons, whose likenesses George Lucas does not own, and who have never so much as whiffed an illegal substance, the wisdom of her stories resonates. She spoke, for example about resentment, saying that resentment is like drinking poison and then waiting for the other person to die. It's a self-destructive emotion that only hurts the bearer, and while she did not make any recommendations regarding forgiveness, she did recommend one of my favorite solutions ever: avoidance.

She said that sometimes we find heaven by backing away from hell. In her case, she was talking about destructive behaviors and relationships. But personal hells vary depending on the shape of your life. There are crosses we are obliged to bear. Occasionally, though, we are given a choice. We don't have to problematize every situation. We shouldn't live our lives constantly spoiling for a fight. Limitations are not dares, and even if they were, you don't have to confront each one with "Challenge accepted!" Sometimes, we can save ourselves from our own versions of hell.

If we do make the mistake of f***ing up royally, even when we had the option not to do so, then the next best thing would be to laugh at ourselves, if only in retrospect. Because if the mistakes of our lives don't turn out to be funny, then they would just be true.

Goodbye for now

2011-10-04T01:44:00.000-07:00

Today was my last day with my CS 21 A classes. Technically, we should still have one more meeting on Thursday, however we've covered the course material, so they are receiving the first and only free cut I've given this sem. Being inept at dramatic goodbyes, I ended the class with my usual, "Are we done? Can I go?" When I noticed that everyone was playing Tetris or checking Facebook, I said, "OK, bye!" and left the room.

I've grown emotionally attached to this batch, which doesn't happen very often. Then again, this was an unusual batch. They were loud, somewhat needy, surprisingly insecure, and addicted to Tetris, Facebook and 9Gag. They were also driven, focused, and I-want-to-harvest-your-soul talented. Many were sweet, and others you want to just pat on the head and say, "There, there." My feelings about the members of the class were all over the spectrum, and maybe that's what makes this batch memorable.

It's hard to say whether I will be able to handle these same students again. My teaching load over the last eight years has been minimal because of admin work and research commitments. I tend to meet students when they're freshmen and then, if I'm lucky, when they're working on their seniors' theses. I'm hoping that, with the promise of professional normalcy on the horizon, I will get to meet with these students again somewhere in the middle of the process. It would be nice to work with them again.

Generations

2011-10-03T16:23:00.000-07:00

During early part of the ProgVar dinner, the party split into two groups--the freshmen and the upperclassmen. I noticed that the upperclassmen tended to be more quiet, more serious. Conversations revolved around (sigh) programming and problem solving. Perhaps this was because we, the faculty, sat at their table. When you have Doc Mana, David, Jess and me at your table, I guess there really is no choice but to keep the conversation clean as well as nerdy.

The freshmen were like a pack of hyperactive labrador retriever puppies. They played cards. They kidded around. At some point, one of the upperclassmen tattled, "Maam, the kids are in the garden." And they were. In the dark. Playing ninja.

They say that classes becoming more and more quiet as they become more senior. While each class has its own personality (Section A is much more rambunctious than Section B, for example), I generally find this observaiton to be true. The atmosphere, for example, at the ALLS tends to be library-like without me having to tell people to be shush. The atmosphere in the freshman classes, on the other hand, is all about Facebook, Tetris, and My Little Pony.

What a difference a few years makes!

Things your students teach you

2011-10-01T16:35:00.000-07:00

Last night, we hosted a party for the ProgVar teams, management staff and coaches to thank them for all the work they have invested so far. You learn a lot about and from people by just hanging out with them.

I learned how to play Mao. I learned that Gabby is devious in a non-malicious way and that Daniel's emotional expressions make the game twice as fun. (ALLS team, we should hook him up to an Emotiv...).

I thought that it wasn't wise for students to pwn their teachers so close to the finals, but I was quickly reminded that "what goes on in the game stays in the game".

David and I learned that Doc Mana never changes.

I learned that there are ways of sneaking into the dorm without getting caught.

I learned that if you get full from one beer, you should switch to hard liquor instead. (There was no alcohol during this party.)

I learned that our kids can play anything with a keyboard. Enzo, Vernon and Francis all took to the piano and provided us with the night's soundtrack. (Should I bring an electric piano to Subic?)

I learned that some kids really don't read email, or if they do, the email doens't register.

I learned that the upperclassmen refer to the freshies as "kids", which is really cute.

I reinforced what I had already known: that spending time with the ProgVar kids is fun. Thank you again, everyone, for coming to the party!

The advisers bill of rights

2011-09-30T06:13:00.001-07:00

Today was the deadline for the submission of thesis proposals for all those who intended to defend this semester. To my chagrin (though not my surprise), I received a number of proposals that were not ready for defense. What annoyed me was that these were proposals from people who had just resurfaced after weeks of silence. They emerge barreling towards the deadline as if I would get out of their way simply because today was the 30th.

Well, let me explain a few things.

The thesis is an iterative process. You send me something to read. I give you feedback. You make improvements. This goes on until I think I'm fairly sure you will not embarass yourself or me during a defense before my peers. (And yes, I have been not only embarassed but in some cases reduced to tears by advisees who were woefully ill-prepared.)

You have to give me time. In the process of giving me time, understand this: You don't get to rush me. You don't get to rush me because after years of advising students I can honestly say that I am NEVER the bottleneck. I turn the paper around as quickly as I can, and that usually means 48 hours unless I'm travelling. Some students, on the other hand, take time. They don't take their time. They don't intentionally delay their work, at least most don't. I'm just saying, sometimes life happens, shifting priorities along the way. I get it. It's no one's fault. But that still doesn't give you the right to rush me.

Many advisers I know start off by providing students with a lot of scaffolding. They give students books, articles, conference papers. They make elaborate diagrams, write out laundry lists of instructions. They provide outlines and structures and frameworks upon which students can hang their ideas. The good students latch on and take flight. Others struggle. Still others can't figure out which way is up. They back off every time the hard work begins. We want you to succeed, but you have to be willing to do the work as well. If you aren't, then maybe you're just not cut out for a higher degree.

Locker room talk

2011-09-26T02:39:00.001-07:00

Redg returned to the gym about one month ago. He loves it. He comes home with stories about his gym mates, plus locker room conversation of a different sort.

Apparently, some of the boys who use gym urinals have a problem with aim. There's a ... pee-print surrounding each urinal. Every male needing to pee has to breach its perimeter. They're all wearing rubber shoes--I mean, this is the gym, right?--but then they have to walk back into to the gym, their soles stamped with a special bathroom floor cocktail. They track other people's pee across the wooden floors, on which scores of men and women do their pilates.

I was thinking of going back to the gym when my sabbatical started. Now I think I'll exercise at home.

Envy this

2011-09-23T17:56:00.000-07:00

One of my close friends in Ateneo envies me for all the travel that comes with my line of work. On the few occasions when we meet or talk, he asks whether I am coming or going. More often than I'd like, the answer is that I'd just come from one place and am about to leave for another. He sighs and says, "God, I envy you!"

That's not a sentiment with which I can relate, mainly because my disposition towards any work trip is the same, whether it be a meeting along Roxas Boulevard, a talk in Cebu, or a conference in Kansas: Do the job and then go home. I've been told more than once to tack on a day or two to each trip to allow myself to stop and smell the roses. Meh. I'll chill when I get home, thanks.

If you must envy me for my job, here are some of the things that are worth envying, in my own opinion:

Envy me the opportunity to dress up. The job cemented my relationships with Liz, Zara, Giorgio, Cole, and, most recently, Massimo. It has nurtured my clothes whore self with the mantra, "Oh, I need this for work."

Envy me the OIR staff. They know their jobs. They do them well. They have my back. And they love our students.

Envy me the mandate to show off. I've had visits with partners in which I've been asked, "Remind us again: Who are you, and why are we partners with you?" This is not the time to be modest, especially when the question comes after the statement, "Oh, we didn't expect you to be a woman.". On more than one occasion, I've been asked, "Are your students smart?" Hmph. You have to be able to talk about our credentials--the 150 years of history, the illustrious alumni, the rankings, the outreach, the formation, etc--with conviction and without claiming to be perfect.

Envy me the outsider's perspective. It helps to see your university through the eyes of your (would-be) partners. It helps with details like what information we need on our website and where the information should be located. It helps you take note of our unique selling points such as our social entrepreneurship projects and our immersion and internship programs. It gives you an appreciation of what makes us different--that the sometimes maligned formation that we tout really is something special. It makes you realize that our version of magis is sometimes not magis enough. We have miles to go before we sleep.

Those are the things that I would envy. But that's just me.

Not for everyone

2011-09-21T22:15:00.000-07:00

We sometimes do our students the injustice of trying to oversell them on higher degrees--Go for an MS! Go for a PhD!--as if the appendages on your last name spell the difference between success and failure in "real life". Advanced degrees are not for everyone. In certain contexts, like research or academia, a PhD is mandatory. In many, many other contexts, you can live an extremely successful professional life without ever being called "Doctor."

My advice to everyone thinking about a higher degree: Know why it is that you want it. Do you anticipate a career in academia? Then go for it. Do you think you need it to get rich and famous? Iffy. Do you think it will open more opportunities? It will, but only of a certain type. Is it because higher degrees are all the rage? You might be better off with designer stilettos. They're cheaper and way sexier. Know why you want it. This way, you'll at least have some measure of whether having it got you what it was you really wanted.

A lesson in appreciation

2011-09-20T16:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, DISCS played host to a group of students from a university in the north of the Philippines. This happens several times a semester: Students from other schools come to tour our campus and see our facilties.

It so happened that the group was roaming the second floor of Faura during my CS 21 a class. My students were completing an exercise and I was going person-to-person answering questions. I was distracted, though, when I kept seeing faces peering through the glass panel of the door. I finally stuck my head out and said, "May I help you?" Our college kids who were acting as tour guides explained that this was a tour. They were hoping to show the group the labs but all of the rooms were occupied. I asked if they wanted to come in. They asked whether it was ok. I said sure. They went to gather the group. I returned to my classroom and said, "Ok, guys, you're going to get leered at. There's a tour group coming in. Look like you're doing something important!"

The group entered. Their guide asked us to give an overview of what we were doing. I asked Gabby Sanchez, my class beadle, to take point. He gave the elevator speech quite well. I was very proud. (Thank you, Gabby). The guide explained that this is how things normally went--that the teacher would explain a topic, the class would listen and then try to put concepts into practice. I couldn't resist underscoring the point, "See guys? You would normally listen to me."

As the tour group left, some of the students asked me why they were taking a tour of Ateneo, of all places. I said, "Because they want to see us doing all this cool stuff!"

Cool stuff aside, though, Andrei Coronel mentioned that the details that impressed the tour group were typically things we take for granted. For instance, they were amazed at the fire hose and even the cork boards we had lining the corridors.

I know there are some students among our ranks who roll their eyes at all the immersion and immersion-style activities that we force them to undergo. Even I catch myself suppressing exasperation when our students can't participate in this or that co-curricular activity because of NSTP or INTACT or immersion. Sigh... But then you meet people who are floored by the minutiae that we don't even notice anymore and you have to think that, yeah, we do need some waking up, don't we?

Tips for attending conventions

2011-09-16T18:05:00.001-07:00

Last year, I attended my first-ever huge convention for OIR. By "huge" I mean there were thousands of people and football fields worth of exhibition space. The workshops were spread across several buildings. And I didn't know a soul. As soon as I received my convention ID and packet, I retreated into a void under a staircase, to regain my nerve.

There are things you should do before and during the convention to prevent disorientation. You should set a calendar of appointments. You should pre-select the talks and workshops you will attend. You should bring information about your relationships and exchanges with all partner schools, including the ones you are not set to meet. You should bring information about your school because there are bound to be questions about timetables, costs, housing, visas and so on.

One last, important tip: Wear very comfortable shoes. Unless you have your own booth, it's unlikely that you will get to sit down at all. You'll be on your feet for the whole day. Even the lunch tables are designed for people to eat while standing up. Make sure your footwear is up to the task.

***

There are also things that the convention organizers can do to help. They can choose a venue that has a lot of seating. The goal of these conventions is networking and to support that, you to create spaces for people to sit and chat. I've been to three of these conventions. Only one was located in a venue that had built-in seating in every wall, corner and post. The other two had random tables and chair scattered about, and they were always full. Food and drinks should be included in the conference fees. One of the three I've attended did not provide food and drinks, which was unconscionable considering the convention fee was so expensive.

What's it to you?

2011-09-14T22:46:00.000-07:00

Several years ago, a colleague asked me in confidence for my opinion and my vote--for or against--on a proposal. I read through the proposal and completely hated it. I was overwhelmingly against it. However, I hesitated to document my opinion because (a) none of these things are ever kept confidential, (b) there were bound to be consequences for stating a negative opinion, and (c) there were political forces at work that I imagined would make my opinion (or any opinion) moot--the social cost would have been for nothing.

Still, I asked two friends for their take on the matter. Should I recuse myself? Was it worth it to risk taking a position?

One friend said I should be candid, explaining to the colleague why my opinion might come off as harsh. She said to trust this colleague to use his own judgment to correct for any bias or unfairness. The other friend said, look, you're the only one who can say these things, so go ahead and say them. So I did. To my surprise, the colleague agreed with me.

The punchline is that none of our opinions swayed the outcome. The proposal was approved for many, many reasons having nothing

The lessons:

Descisions are complicated.
Your opinions matter less than you think.

A Danish supper

2011-09-13T16:44:00.000-07:00

Last night, I bought myself what I am assuming is a typical Danish supper: an open-faced sandwich. It began thick slice of bread, generously buttered. The slice was topped with a crisp lettuce leaf followed by two fillets of velvety smoked trout. The trout was garnished with a dollop of mayonnaise (prompting me to recall the ProgVar Pro Anti-mayonnaise League), tiny, sweet steamed shrimp, bell pepper slices and a teaspoon of black caviar. To mix things up a bit, the kitchen finished the dish with some canned pineapple bits.

Yum...

I would eat that again.

I heart Cathay Pacific

2011-09-13T00:12:00.000-07:00

I am not officially connected with Cathay Pacific. I'm just a customer who loves the airline.

Their economy seats have individual TV monitors with on-demand programming. During this last long haul, I wasn't able to sleep on the plane. I stopped and started several movies. I listened to the albums of Martin Nievera, Gary Valenciano and Ogie Alcacid (I was feeling sentimental!). I watched the judging portion of America's Next Top Model. I fast-forwarded through Anthony Bourdain's trip to Cambodia. I wouldn't have been able to do that on, say, Delta.

Their movies and TV episodes have ads, true, but the ads are limited to the beginning of each show. During my last Delta flight, they had ads even in the middle of their TV shows, placed in the exact breaks where ads would be if you watched the episode on network-streamed video.

Cathay's economy seats have electrical outlets. You can plug in your laptop and work, which is what I did in between shows. Again, this is not something you can do on many other airlines.

I will dare say their food is better than most. I selected a stir-fried chicken. It came with a sachet of hot sauce, a mooncake and Hagen Daaz chocolate ice cream. In between meals, they have baskets of fruit, Timtams, and other biscuits for the taking. You can also request for cup noodles at any time.

When your flight schedule gets messed up, they have your back. Twice already, because of forces beyond their control, they billeted me in hotels overnight and made sure I caught my flight the next day.

Finally, they're not in-your-face about the profit-centeredness of the business. American airlines end each flight with a variation of "We know you have a choice in carriers and we appreciate your business". Cathay says, "We thank you for joining us on this flight and look forward to taking care of you again."

I don't enjoy long-haul flights much. Staying seated for 12 to 16 hours takes its toll. However, being on a good airline such as Cathay makes the journey much more pleasant.

Staying in place

2011-09-10T15:12:00.000-07:00

The past week has been one of reminding us of our place. The QS rankings have come out. We slid from 307 to 360. We lost our last UAAP Seniors round robin game to the Adamson Falcons. We lost yesterday's Inter-University Programming Competition to UP, DLSU, and FEU. We sit by as UP and DLSU establish strong presence in local and international conferences. Yes, there are reasons for these outcomes, and yes, we should be gentlemanly in our conduct and cheer for the winners.

In the next breath, though, let's at least have the honesty to admit that, amidst all this sportsmanlike conduct, losing is not and will never be the desired outcome. No one joins a competition hoping to lose. Yes, some competitions are friendlier than others. Other competitions, you join "for the experience." Mostly, though, when you're in, you're in to win.

I know we have skills. I know we are not as good as some, but we are far better than most. In the increasingly distant past, we didn't have to break a sweat to make this point. However, times have changed and we now have to break a sweat and then some just to stay in place. We need to train harder, work faster, work smarter to continue to be among the best. If we don't, we'll have to learn to be content to watch the winners walk on by, and that is something that our egos cannot abide.

If you want to annoy your female guests...

2011-09-08T18:37:00.000-07:00

... have a formal reception on a lawn.

My mom attended a wedding reception that was held on a lawn. The evening before the wedding, it rained. Not only was the ground soft, it was also muddy. Scores of female guests dragged their wedding finery across the lawn, tilling the earth with their Jimmy Choos. The horror.

The sum of her parts

2011-09-05T16:16:00.000-07:00

During the first third of my formal schooling, I was a lackluster student. My grade school years were spent in a haze. I felt as if I sonambulated from one class to the next, never really paying attention, clueless about mastery tests and group work, and only perfunctorily caring about whatever showed up in my report card. While my classmates agonized over how many "Outstanding" marks they did or didn't receive, my only goal was to scrape by. My mother made her stance quite clear: Don't fail because repeating a grade will cost us another year's worth of tuition. She sounded off a few tsk tsks at my propensity to underachieve and, yes, she'd let out an exasperated sigh while comparing me against my more accomplished cousin. However, neither of my parents primed me for academic distinctions.

It was a surprise, therefore, that I was allowed to skip grade 7 and move on to first year high school. It turned out that, while my grade were just average, I tested well. My IQ turned out to be above average and my achievement test scores were high enough to convince my teachers that I was ready for high school.

Well, they were wrong. My first year was dismal. I got straight D's in Filipino and Social Studies. Everything else meandered around a C or C+. I don't think I earned a single B that year. I don't know if an extra year in grade school would have helped me mature, but the die was cast and all that was left was for me to eke by, avoiding failure by the skin of my teeth.

The next three years were spent "getting with the program". I very slowly woke up to the discipline of studying, of working with other people, of preparing, and of actually making an effort to learn something. I finally hit honor status in third year. To my surprise (and no doubt my parents'), I graduated with honors.

By the time I reached college, my study habits were in place. Terrified of failure, I spent all my time studying. The fear helped me survive, but in many ways it paralyzed me as well. I avoided all distractions--extra curriculars, TV, etc. I was afraid of taking academic risks. Above all, I did not, at the time, develop a very mature understanding or perspective of my field. Instead of taking the opportunity to step back and appreciate the wider perspective of my discipline and how each of my subjects integrated with the other, my eye was always on making sure I passed the next test.

Still, I looked good on paper. My grades were more than decent and I graduated honorable mention.

I was lucky, in a sense, because I didn't have a great many choices when I was growing up. As undergraduates, there was no such thing as the JTA, ProgVar, or the Imagine Cup. DISCS didn't offer specializations. There were a very limited number of scholarships available for grad school. And no one poached us the way our undergraduates are poached today. If these choices had been available to me when I was an undergraduate, I would no doubt have been paralyzed again. I probably would have stuck to the mainstream, avoided the risks, and played it safe.

When I look at Socorro, I thank God that she is not me. She is so much better than I ever was. From day 1, she understood what was expected from her in school. She embraced learning. She engaged. She excelled without me having to tell her to do so. Her grade school was non-traditional and didn't give out academic distinctions. In high school, though, she was a solid 2nd honor student from first year to third year.

The honors, while good on their own, were an indication to me that she had the discipline and maturity to manage her academics. Redg and I told her that her academic strength should make her brave. We didn't want her to suffer from my cowardice. We wanted her to have the confidence to take a few risks.

Earlier this year, she decided she wanted to pursue spend three weeks in Brown. It was the biggest gamble she'd ever made--taking three weeks off during her senior year, so close to the college entrance exams. As a family, we discussed the possible costs. We knew she'd be under a lot of stress. We knew she was risking her academic standing. Was she ready to lose her honor status? She said she was. So off she went.

For six weeks of her life--the one before she left, the three away and the two when she got back--she lived in the academic equivalent of a pressure-cooker. She had to keep up with the lessons in Brown as well as manage her high school academics long-distance. When she got back to Manila, she landed hard, arriving on a Sunday night and showing up in school six hours later, to a flurry of make up exams, the UPCAT and the quarterly finals. She survived off adrenalin and caffeine.

"Do you have any regrets," I asked. "Ask me after I get my grades," she replied.

Soon after the finals, we received her report card. She got a C in one subject. The rest were As and Bs.

This is ok, we said. Not as good as we had hoped. Not as bad as we had feared. It was a cost we were ready to pay.

What came as a suprise, though, was that we learned she is no longer eligible for graduation honors. The news knocked the wind out of me. Three years of consistency were wiped away by a single grade. It was as if none of those years mattered. She would be judged, so it seemed, by the sum of her parts.

We weren't angry with the school. They had done what they could to support her while she was away. Lord knows I wasn't angry with her. She studied as hard as she humanly could. It was an unforseen cost that we now have to pay.

"Regrets?" I asked. "No," she replied, adding, "Synthetic happiness!" with a smile.

She continues to be so much better that I ever was.

I find myself thinking about the 1994 movie "With Honors" about a Harvard student played by Brendan Fraser whom a homeless man, played by Joe Pesci, tutors about life and love. Joe Pesci's character loves to quote Walt Whitman. One quote describes to me what Socorro did: "to court destruction with taunts, to feed the remainder of life with one hour of fullness and freedom - one brief hour of madness and joy." And as with Brendan Fraser's character, I am certain that she will "graduate from life with honor, and without regret."

Something good

2011-09-04T16:46:00.000-07:00

Late last week, I received a thesis proposal document from one of my MS students. It had been a long time coming. Despite the fact that he was building on past work, he had struggled to internalize the topic extensively enough to write about it. Finally, though, the paper landed in my inbox and I was quite pleased. He had done what looked to me like a thorough job of reading and synthesizing past work. One more iteration and he should be ready to defend.

I wish I had more of these stories to tell.

Synthetic happiness

2011-09-03T15:42:00.000-07:00

Prayer of an Unknown Confederate Soldier, aka The Creed for the Disabled

I asked God for strength that I might achieve.
I was made weak that I might learn humbly to obey.
I asked for health that I might do greater things.
I was given infirmity that I might do better things.
I asked for riches that I might be happy.
I was given poverty that I might be wise.
I asked for power that I might have the praise of men.
I was given weakness that I might feel the need of God.
I asked for all things that I might enjoy life.
I was given life that I might enjoy all things.
I got nothing that I asked for, but everything I hoped for.
Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.
I am, among all men, most richly blessed.

We don't always get what we want, expect or deserve. Our faith tells us, though, that we get what it is that we need. Popular psychology further tells us that we learn to be happy with the cards that we are dealt. Indeed, turns of fortune, whether good or bad, don't have as great an impact on our levels of happiness in the long run. In the meantime, though, being present to the moment requires us to attend to current feelings, whatever their valence. In my case, we just received some disappointing news. It's not life-threatening, just not what we expected. Eventually, I will find solace in the prayer I just quoted. For now, though, I'll settle for a quote from Conan O'Brien's commencement address at Dartmouth:

In 2000, I told graduates "Don't be afraid to fail." Well now I'm here to tell you that, though you should not fear failure, you should do your very best to avoid it. Nietzsche famously said "Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger." But what he failed to stress is that it almost kills you. Disappointment stings and, for driven, successful people like yourselves it is disorienting.

Involving the parents

2011-09-01T22:19:00.000-07:00

As a teacher, I only end up speaking to parents (or grandparents) if their son or daughter is in some kind of academic peril. That doesn't happen often. I can only recall speaking to four moms, four dads and one grandfather in my entire career (not counting open houses). At the college level, our kids are supposed to be able to handle their own problems. They shouldn't be babied anymore. The training wheels are off.

Still, when Jess and I have to do the soccer mom routine with our ProgVar kids, I can't help but wish that I could get the parents of these kids to be more involved. I say this not because I want to dump the work on someone else. Not by a longshot. ProgVar is often the highlight of my week! I say this because parents deserve to see how challenging the training is, how hard their kids have to work, and how motivated they are to stick with it, despite all their other requirements. Parents would be very proud. When I must speak to parents about their kids, it's almost always bad news--failing grades, behavioral problems, cheating. I would like to speak to parents about how well their kids are doing.

The problem is, I'm not sure the kids would like their parents hanging out with us.

Trust your gut.

2011-09-01T01:05:00.000-07:00

I finished Jonah Lehrer's "How We Decide" in one sitting. That says that it was an accessible, easy, enjoyable read (either that or I really didn't get it). It recounted anecdotal as well as empirical evidence about how people gather and use information for decisions, both big and small. The take home message to me was that when a decision factor can be narrowed down to a single variable, e.g. cost, size, quantity, etc. then the decision is made without debate. However, when a decision depends on many variables as well as unquantifiables such as values, priorities, visions, mission, and so on, we should use our brains to gather as much information as possible then use our gut to finally make the choice.

In one of our animated conversations about diving, two of my more experienced friends told me that my gut is always right. If the water looks too rough, if the weather looks dark and dreary, if you aren't feeling so well--if there is any factor that provokes hesitation or fear, then you back out. The experience isn't worth the risk.

I've always been one to listen to my head instead of my heart. I've only just recently learned to start trusting my intuition about people, places and experiences. My breakthrough came after listening to a talk by Emy Liwag. She said that emotions were another form of information. Emotions aren't the enemy of rationality. In fact, they supplement cold cognition. Once of their strengths lies in that they are faster than thought. Fear tells you that you are in danger. Fatigue tells you you are overburdened. Happiness tells you that something good has happened. Disgust tells you something violated your sense of order or propriety. Sadness tells you you've lost something important.

Feeling something doesn't make you irrational. In fact, feeling something is part of what makes us smart.

Respecting your limits

2011-08-30T05:23:00.000-07:00

This weekend, Socorro and I went to Anilao to complete a course on advanced open water diving. By the end of the course, we were supposed to complete deep dives (up to 100 feet), multilevel dives, a night dive and current dives. We also had to navigate underwater and fine-tune our buoyancy control. I expected us to come home with our certifications in hand. However, that didn't happen.

The water was rough. (I was told that, no, it was actually calm, but for someone who drives a computer for most of the day, who gets seasick just listening to waves and whose only regular balancing act is walking from Bel to Faura in heels, anything more than a slight chop is rough.) Coming back from our first dive, I was ready to hurl my guts. Maybe it was testosterone, but I managed not to throw up.

That evening, we went on our night dive. That was unnerving. I'm generally not frightened of the dark. At home and even while I was living alone in the US, I would habitually walk around with the lights off. However, diving into infinite blackness with a single flashlight, and, worse yet, taking that plunge with one of the most important people in the world to me, I had to make a conscious effort to stay calm and focused, to remember our training, and to resist the temptation to stare into the void.

At some point, we crossed paths with another group. Socorro made the mistake of peeling off from our group and following the other. Our instructor and I followed her. She wasn't in any danger but we had to stick to our own group for safety's sake. I think she was a little freaked out after that--she held my hand for the rest of the dive.

Towards the end of the dive, we were lined up elbow to elbow and asked to turn off our lights so that we could marvel at the bioluminescent plankton. It was truly wonderous--like getting sprinkled with fairy dust or bathing in fireflies. However, both Socorro and I had to struggle to turn our flashlights back on. Again, it took a deliberate effort to not panic. I couldn't see her. I could feel her against my elbow, but I couldn't see her. Finally, we got our lights back on. The relief washed over me. I felt as if I could breathe again.

Then, it was time to head back for the boat. Upon breaking the surface, the tension and the motion finally got to me. I threw up big time. It's not unusual for divers to do so. You just take off your regulator let it all come out. I've thrown up on dives before, but this was the worst ever.

The ride on the way back to the resort continued to be rough. The swell prevented us from docking, so we had to exit into the surf as the boat was being tossed to and fro. I was walking to the prow when the surge threw the boat back. Sports klutz that I am, I fell. Fortunately, one of the boatmen was holding my hand. He slowed my fall and I didn't get hurt. We had to negotiate the short but dark and rocky walk back to the lobby. Even that part was a little freaky.

Before turning in, we were briefed on the next day's dives. I thought of chickening out because the sea was so rough and I was still unnerved by the night dive. I felt as though I'd exhaused my supply of courage for the weekend. But I coulnd't very well turn tail with my daughter expecting me to be brave.

When we got up this morning, though, Socorro wasn't feeling well. She asked if she could skip the last two dives. I said sure. We'd both skip. Our instructors were very understanding. I promised we'd be back to finish the course soonish, maybe after the ACET.

I realized from this weekend that I'm not a very adventurous diver. I'm ok with easy dives in flat seas. As long as there are lots of fish and a decent amount of coral, I'm good. I'm still determined to complete the course--we both are. I understand that there's value in learning these skills. As our instructors put it, sometimes, even on easy dives, you get caught in a current, get separated from the group, or your dive master might need to help other divers. You will need to know how to cope with the situation and exit the dive safely. I'm not yet at the point, though, where exercising these skills is fun for me. But who knows. Maybe with time. For now, I've reached my taste for adventure is satiated.

Erring on the side of overdressing

2011-08-27T14:18:00.000-07:00

I wasn't supposed to have a meeting that day. It was a Saturday. I had a thesis proposal defense to attend at DISCS. That was it. So, I came to school in linen cutoffs, a ratty blue blouse, and (gasp) slippers (hey, in fairness, they were Bass).

The defense was over by 10:30. I was packing up my stuff to go home. Then my phone rang. It was the office of Fr. Ben. The president of so-and-so university are here. Can you come to the Board Room for lunch? What the...?! I called OIR in a panic, asking if any one else was dressed presentably. No one was.

So, I went home and changed.

That seems exaggerated, I know. But you didn't see what I was wearing. It was one of those outfits that Socorro rolls her eyes at--never a good thing. And despite my blue-and-white motif, it was not something I should be wearing when meeting with a president of any kind.

If there's one lesson I've learned in OIR, it's better to overdress. Appointments or no appointments, people do sometimes just show up and, when they do, you have to look the part.

A season of lasts

2011-08-24T17:13:00.000-07:00

The next few months are bringing some anticipated changes. At the close of a recent meeting, a colleague turned to me and observed, "This may be your last (name of group) meeting." I said, "This will be my last (name of group) meeting." We both smiled.

I was very fond of the members of the group, and while I'm fairly certain I will continue to see some of them on an individual basis, it is unlikely that I will ever sit with them as a group and in the same context again.

The months to come will bring more of these meetings--last meetings. Every goodbye will sting, some more than others.

Yet I can't bring myself to dwell much on the pangs of letting go. This blog entry is probably as much mourning as I'll allow myself. Mostly, I look ahead, to what happens in the season of what's next.

What we habitually do

2011-08-24T06:33:00.000-07:00

One of my former students said that a job is not just what you do, it's who you are, and that to change who you are is to change what you do. I see his point. Your choice of work says something about you. Your competence at a task also says something about you. (The two don't necessarily go together.) The work that people assign to you says something about how other people perceive you and your capabilities.

Given how complex we are as individuals, though, there are very few jobs that allow us to be who we are completely. I therefore count myself lucky. The job at OIR taps into my vanity, my ability to find my way through airports and train stations, my stock knowledge of amusing but otherwise useless facts, my ability to "speak food" in 10 languages (most easily accomplished when menus have English subtitles), and my respectable-though-irrelevant academic credentials. The research provides my nerd-fix. There's nothing like long hours of staring at data, spitting out little bits of code, and writing academic papers to get that dopamine high. Finally, and perhaps at the crux of it all, I love to teach. My students are insane but fun. They're as inspiring as they are infuriating. They're never dull.

When I was younger, I used to think that I could leave the Ateneo at any time and still be happy. I'm starting to doubt that. If Aritstole is right and we are what we habitually do, then what I am is an academic. If I had to change jobs, I would have to change who I am.

Manipulating our children

2011-08-21T04:42:00.000-07:00

Today, Redg and I had a long discussion about an article by Dr. Guss Rodriguez. In the magazine "The Ateneo Way", Guss speaks to his fellow parents about the meaning of an Ateneo education and explains why he believed that his daughter was better formed in the Ateneo than in an Ivy league school. Guss says, "...she may get a superior technical educaiton in some top ranking unversity abroad but only in the Philippines will she have a superior education in being a Filipino for Filipinos."

Redg was uncomfortable with this notion. Redg thought that if a child's values were in place, then he or she would find her way into service for country. Using himself as an example, he said that he had decided at an early age to stay in the Philippines and make a life for himself here. He had the opportunity to immigrate to the US. His family had applied for immigrant status when he was just a boy. The year that we graduated from college, the US Embassy informed them that their application had been approved and that they could begin making plans to relocate. He decided that no, he wanted to remain a Filipino. He did not attribute his decision to his Ateneo education nor to his family, really, so he resists the idea that an outside influence such as a university education can sway a person's decision. Indeed, he bristled at the thought that we thought we could manipulate our children one way or the other.

My perspective was different. I don't think our children's values are formed at the college level. I think they know these values mentally, but values are a way of life and until put into practice, they remain at theoretical. You can claim to love your country, but when the opportunity arises to work in a world-class laboratory (or company) with top flight researchers (or fellow employees), it's easy to nuance our nationalism with a more embracing, sophisticated ethic of global excellence. As Guss puts it, "...years in the glitter of a new would could weaken the bindings of promises made in times of greate emotions." Yes, I've seen that happen many, many times. Away from family, away from roots, freed of the burden of God and country, exposed to a heady new independence, new loves, and unimagined potential, it is unsurprising that many people choose to pursue life in decidedly greener pastures.

It is a cliche among parents to hope and pray that "we raised our children right" and that they will know what to do when they have difficult choices to make. Part of the process of "raising them right" is manipulating their world view. (It's an ugly word, manipulation, but it seems appropriate.) We take them to church. We nurture our family relationships. We snag them into outreach and charity activities. We help them choose a university that will provide them with a solid education, but within a context of societal needs. Theologian Frederick Buechner was quoted as saying that "vocation is where our greatest joy meets the world's greatest need". What many of us want for our children is that they pursue the passions that bring them happiness and fulfillment, but in ways that will render the greatest service. We hope that they grow up with a sense of social responsibility. This is where I think the Ateneo education plays its own role in the grand manipulation. (Ugly word again, I know.)

Now, whether they actually buy into this world view is not within our control. There are children/students who don't buy into the view, to whom family is a trap from which to escape, education is a commodity, and adulthood is the promise of unfettered exploration into whatever-the-hell-I-want. At this point, I guess Redg's opinion and mine converge. I was looking at the whole process, he was looking at the end point. If the child's values are formed, regardless of where he or she goes, he will find a way to be of service. I don't doubt that. But while his values aren't formed, while we have access to their thoughts, while they are still willing to listen to our own, we try to get through to them, to teach them the things that are important to us, and pray God that they will find them important, too.

Yes, I do have a life

2011-08-20T17:39:00.000-07:00

At the start of each semester, I give my students my email address and tell them that they can email me at any time if they have questions. I also tell them that if I don't respond to them within 24 hours, email me again because I probably didn't get the message.

Most days, I'm able to respond to messages within a few hours, sometimes a few minutes. Other days, it takes me longer. Why? Because, believe it or not, I don't spend all my hours by my computer or my cel phone. I do actually have a life that requires time away from these devices. I spend time with other people, having meals, watching movies, diving and otherwise doing things that have nothing to do with the Ateneo, computer science or teaching.

I do love my vocation as a teacher and it is a huge, huge part of who I am. But it's not the *only* thing I am.

No expectations

2011-08-16T18:26:00.000-07:00

I've heard that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference. Hate implies a continued feeling. The object of your hatred still receives affirmation. He or she deserves or at least elicits a reaction. Indifference, on the other hand, implies that the object doesn't matter.

As teachers, we are predisposed to loving our students. We care about them even before meeting them. We want only the best for them. We want them to achieve, to succeed. As time wears on, though, the feelings we have for them become more nuanced. Some students, we like more and more. Others demand more attention (*rolls eyes).

Then there are those who meander away from you. They fail--refuse?--to live up to expectations. You confront the, you fight them, and lose. You fret about time and effort wasted. You ask them what the hell is happening and don't get an answer. It's as if they've drifted into an academic Twilight Zone where no peer, parent or teacher can reach them. When this happens, you lose hope. Teachers abandon all expectations, our version of transitioning from love to indifference.

The elements of a surprise

2011-08-15T19:02:00.000-07:00

I'm one of those KJ people who does not like surprises. Everything about them runs against my grain.

A surprise is an imposition of someone else's judgment on your own. Someone else decides (or takes a gamble) that you will like the content of the surprise. Me, I like to be consulted. I have very strong ideas about what I like and what I don't. I also have strong ideas about how I want to spend my time. When someone abducts you with a surprise, someone else commits your time to something that you hadn't anticipated, at the expense of something you might have already planned.

A surprise entails deception. To manipulate you into the right time and place for the surprise to be sprung, you have to be misled. I don't like being lied to, even for the "right" reasons.

A surprise obliges you to be grateful. When people have troubled themselves to do something they think will make you happy, it is a cardinal sin to NOT be happy. Anything short of tears of joy would be hurtful and could create a rift between you and the people who planned the surprise. You have to be grateful. You have to be happy. Regardless of how you really feel.

It comes as a tremendous irony therefore that I was a willing co-conspirator in a recent surprise. It was a tension-filled, terrifying experience. I felt that at any moment things could go very badly, in a myrad of ways. Fortunately, the object of the surprise was someone far more gracious and far less jaded than me. The surprise was as perfect as her response.

At the end of the day, though, I realized that this was not something I would like to do again. The risks were simply too great.

Throwdown

2011-08-12T14:13:00.000-07:00

Mark Punzalan, one of our ACM alums, wondered whether years in industry had robbed him of his problem-solving mojo. This started a Facebook thread in which a bunch of us toyed with a question, "How a team of ACM veterans hold up against the current generation of programming blue bloods?"

So, dearest alums, here's the throwdown: On August 27, we are hosting the 6th and last round of the Australia New Zealand Algorithmics and Computation (ANZAC) League contest. (If you haven't heard of it, ANZAC is a 6-round, no-prizes, no reg fee, friendly ACM-style competition. A central cite in Australia provides the problem sets. The contests themselves are distributed, that is, they are held in different sites all over Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines. The contests are 5 hours long. All sites start at the same time.) What I'd like to see is a team or two of our alums competing in Round 6. Whaddaya say?

Core competencies

2011-08-11T01:28:00.000-07:00

One of my colleages just returned from a program in which Ateneo students joined students from three other Asian schools for a week-long series of activities on character formation. During the program, the group visited homes for the aged, homes for the disabled and other such communities that take care of marginalized members of society. Upon his return, this colleague recounted how our own students were old hands at these sorts of engagement and reflection activities and how faculty and students from other schools were amazed at the how "with it" the Ateneans were.

It sounds like our integrated formation activities are one of our core strengths, something other schools envy and wish upon their own curricula. Indeed, several of our partner schools send students to us on a regular basis to engage with our community partners. They are consistently stunned at how extensive our network is, and how these types of formative activities are part and parcel of the Ateneo education.

We also noted how unfortuante it was that some of our own look upon these activities as bothers or distractions. Shrug.

Feeding children

2011-08-09T17:05:00.001-07:00

Taking care of the ALLS kids and the ProgVar is teaching me more and more about what kids today eat. For the most part, they consume everything and lots of it. I've seen our kids decimate bags of flat tops and chocnut. They've scarfed down platters of barbecued ribs and rice by the cavan. Iced tea is a favorite, as is calamansi juice.

But then there are the occasional favorites and preferences that are so amusing they just have to be entertained. We have a couple of kids who don't like mayonaise. Everyone loves lollipops, but we have one person in particular who looks for them, so we make sure we're always stocked. One person explicitly requested for marshmallows, so now we always have marshmallows. We have one boy who doesn't eat junk food or candy and never drinks iced tea or juice. We make sure there's a bottle of water for him during each session and I hand it to him personally before someone else picks it up. One guy doesn't eat pork. Another person eats a lot of fruit. It's cute.

Of course, we can't entertain every dietary quirk. If you come to us with a request for gluten-free, no soy, organic whatever, you are so on your own. But a bottle of water, lollipops and marshmallows? That we can do.

Wednesday shoes

2011-08-05T23:21:00.001-07:00

I love high heels, but you know your heels are too high when you get cramps walking from Bel to Faura.

Yesterday's heels were a little too high. I felt as if I was teetering over. If someone bumped me from behind, I would have fallen face first. These are heels I can only wear when I'm not teaching and when I'm not trekking from the one building to the next. They were, I thought, Wednesday or Friday shoes because these are my shortest days, days when I don't have class. Admittedly, I spent most of the day in the lab, but still, walking from Bel to Faura on point was challenging.

What was pretty amazing, though, was that the shoes didn't chafe. I attribute that to the fact that they a brand that I've been lusting after for a very long time. I finally bit the bullet and bought a pair and, no, the austerity police would not approve.

Am I giving them up? Nope. Not on your life. They're far too purdy to let go. If Natalie Portman can train for months to get in shape for the Black Swan, I can learn to walk in these heels. Don't expect me to wear them to class, though.

Animal sacrifice

2011-08-02T17:26:00.000-07:00

We have a koi pond in our house. We bought our koi when they were tiny. If I recall, Redg paid P15 to P30 each. We overfed them for years and now they maybe 18 inches long and fat as rolled up Sunday newspapers.

Every time we travel, though, one of our kois goes into a depression and kills itself. It jumps out of the pond in the middle of the night, when no one can see or hear it. One of our girls or gardeners finds it the next day, already dead.

There's a Filipino belief (and a Niel Gaimain short story) saying one's pets sarifice themselves in exchange for their master's well-being. The bear the brunt of the misfortune that would otherwise befall the hands that feed them. I'm not a superstitious person, but the regularity and the timing with which the fish go into harikiri mode, added to the fact that we come home safe and sound, gets you thinking.

During Socorro's stay in Brown, we almost lost one of our dogs. Cointreau, one of our male Chows, sped out of the gate. He happens to be our most agile dog, so it was impossible to keep up with him on foot. One of the gardeners, George, grabbed a bike and went after the dog. Finally, Cointreau entered a neighbor's house and was cornered. Our girls arrived by trike and picked him up.

It makes you wonder what sort of danger we were in, to almost cost us Cointreau.

Programming: The non-spectator sport

2011-08-01T00:44:00.000-07:00

For those of you who have never watched an ACM-style programming competition, it is not a spectator sport. All you will see is a room full of geeks hunched over their computers. Typically, only their hands move, usually in a blur of keystrokes. They sometimes get up for bathroom breaks, to drink or to get a bite to eat. Mostly, though, they remain seated and silent, breaking the zen-like atmosphere only to celebrate a point scored or to build up each other's egos with trash-talk like, "Sige na nga: Magaling ka nang mamili ng problem na madali!"

It's unlikely that our programmers will rack up as many adoring fans as Keifer Ravena or Chris Tiu. Gec Chia was my student during the year of his "miracle shot." The niece of a friend of mine asked me to get her a lock of his hair. I said no. I haven't heard of anyone asking for a lock of any of our programmers' hair, and if they did I would seriously worry about what they planned to do with the DNA...

For those of us who appreciate the game, give me a good ACM-style competition over the Olympics, the World Cup, or the UAAP, any day of the week. The typical contest format is that teams of three are given one computer each are asked to solve 8 to 10 problems within a five hour stretch. It is typical for team members to divide-and-conquer. Each team member selects a problem and tries to solve it, consulting with the others when necessary. When a team member thinks he has a solution, he codes it, debugs it and submits it to a central server. The judges test the solution and then send a correct, wrong, or wrong output format.

Each correct format garners a point. When a team gets a point, they also get a balloon. Each incorrect answer incurs a penalty of 20 minutes. The winner is the team who submits the most number of correct answers in the shortest amount of time.

During one ACM competition years ago, our top team was neck-and-neck with a team from another school. We would submit first. They would submit next. During the minutes leading up to the final submissions, I was invoking the name of every Jesuit saint I knew and pacing infront of the scoreboard as some of my friends pace around Araneta during the most tense moments of the UAAP. Finally, the Ateneo team made its last submission. It was correct. We led by one point. The rival team made its own submission soon after. Their answer was also correct. In the end, we tied in terms of number of correct answers but the Ateneo team won because of time.

At the close of each competition, people gather up what have to be the most hard-earned balloons of their lives. They take them home as trophies, sovenirs of the day they got to be bad-ass programmer jocks. We, the coaches and managers, do our share of hugging, congratulating, and consoling. We go home proud in the knowledge that we still have some of the best programming talent in the world.

Alone feels different

2011-07-30T18:19:00.000-07:00

I have lived alone before. During grad school and the Fulbright, I lived for semesters at a time in an apartment, by myself, with no roommates. I know what it is to come home to an empty room, have my meals alone, watch movies alone, clean the apartment and do laundry for myself. Now, when I travel for research or for Ateneo, I am often alone. I get on a plane by myself. I move from the airport to the hotel on my own. I have my own hotel room. I find my way to meetings. And I'm fine. Alone takes a little getting used to, but it's really not that bad.

However, over these last two weeks, with Socorro in Brown and Redg in New York, alone feels different.

For one thing, the dogs love me more. They usually hover around Redg because Redg is always the first to feed them tablescraps. Now, during meals, all of them direct their unwaivering attention towards me.

The silence is unusual. The three of us are constantly talking to one another over meals or in the car. When I take Socorro to school, we chat most of the way. The white noise of life--footfalls, shuffles, creaks, taps, sizzles, snores, giggles--aren't there anymore. They've been replaced by a silence that reminds you that the people you love aren't around.

And then there are all these markers, these reminders that they aren't here. Their desks are empty. Their chairs are empty. Their pillows and blankets have been wrapped in plastic and stored so they don't get dusty. Both Redg's and Socorro's desks are actually clean! That's because neither one is constantly dumping new stuff over old.

I feel the voids more. There's less life in this house without them.

Work with me here.

2011-07-29T06:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Students,

I know there are days when I can be grumpy and demanding. There are weeks, like this week, when I am less able to mask my exasperation. In the midst of all this, pease remember that I am on your side and that I do want you to succeed in the most spectacular of ways. So I nag and pester and bribe and threaten and feed and worry and laugh and joke, all the while hoping and praying that something will come back (preferably in the form of a publishable paper). While I may sometimes strike you as both judge and jury, I am also your ally. I will be the first to tell you in the most strident of ways when you've screwed up, but I am also your staunchest supporter, the person who will stand beside you as you face the firing squad that is your thesis panel. So work with me here.

<3
Didith

Defining the mainstream

2011-07-25T01:34:00.000-07:00

Years ago, I used to work in an office that specialized in helping clients craft strategic information systems plans. We guided clients through a process that involved voluminous documentation, hours of intereviews, and painfully iterative workshops and consultations, to arrive at a roadmap for the structure, purchase, use and support of computers and related resources.

The experience with this company taught me many things about what a strategic plan is and what it does. Simply put: A strategic plan defines what the mainstream activiites of a company will be. It defines what targets are important and, hence, where the company will invest its resources. Given that time and money are limited, the company has to prioritize which goals will get attention and which will be shed. The strategic plan articulates these priorities.

For the more independent-minded among us, strategic plans can be anathema. What about what I want? What about my interests? What about the things that I think are important? My own perpective has been that being part of a bigger community requires a certain amount of buy-in. You have to be drinking even just a little bit of the Cool Aid. Every job has expectations, and while not all jobs require you to ransom your heart and soul, most jobs do require an investment of your intellect and labor. If you can't give of those resources, at least to a professional extent, then it's time to rethink where you are.

My second thought is that you are still free to pursue your interests. You just shouldn't expect institutional support. And I think this is fair. If there is a passion you want to follow that doesn't quite fit corporate priority areas, then you should find your own resources, make the time, and do the work on your own. It isn't fair to ask the institution to care about the same things you care about. You can't expect the institution to invest in you until it is clear that what you are doing is aligned with the institution's broader goals, and until the benefit to the institution is clear. I speak from experience: The only time I became successful at obtaining grant fuding after I'd extablished more of a publication track record. Prior to that, I had to make my own way, and that meant finding my own resources to do what I captured my interests.

(There are compromises to be made, though. Usually there are little pockets of resources that are earmarked for "development". While most of monies are earmarked for the "sure bets", there's a little money available for new ventures, emerging products and experiementation. If you have a solid enough idea, chances are you can still get some support.)

A strategic plan defines the mainstream. If we want to belong to an institution, most of the professional activities we perform must be part of that mainstream.

Stumbling on Happiness

2011-07-23T04:33:00.000-07:00

I've been reading Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert. I learned about his work from TED.com and decided to buy the book. Here's an excerpt that I like a lot:

Regret is an emotion we feel when we blame ourselves for unfortunate outcomes that might have been prevented had we only behaved differently in the past, and because that emotion is decidedly unpleasant, our behavior in the present is often designed to preclude it. Indeed, most of us have elaborate theories about when and why people feel regret, and these theories allow us to avoid the experience. ...

But sometimes these theories are wrong...Indeed, in the long run, people of every age and in every walk of life seem to regret not having done things more than they regret things that they did...

But why do people regret inactions more than actions? One reason is that the psychological immune system has a more difficult time manufacturing positive and credible views of inactions than of actions. Because we do not realize that one psychological immune system can rationalize an excess of courage more easily than an excess of cowardice, we hedge our bets when we should blunder forward.

The Good Games Challenge: The ASSISTment Prize for the Most Motivating Math Games

2011-07-21T22:23:00.001-07:00

Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, MA, calls for submissions to the Good Games Challenge, a competition to design and develop motivating math games. The ASSISTment Prize of US$500 will be given to the team who develops the most effective game at increasing student knowledge in fractions while keeping motivation high.

The games will be judged based on two major criteria: how much the student learned and how interesting they found the game. Teachers in Massachusetts who use the ASSISTment system will randomly assign students the games to test. Afterwards, students will be tested on the knowledge of the topic. The judges will use students’ performance as a basis for selecting the winning game. Your goal therefore is to get students to use the game for a long period of time and learn as much as possible.

Professor Neil Heffernan, the Director of the non-profit ASSISTment system, is sponsoring the contest in cooperation with the Ateneo de Manila University. The games that do particularly well will be highlighted inside the ASSISTment system so that teachers across the world can use these games with their students.

Let the games begin!!

Contest Rules and Eligibility
1. The competition is open to all Ateneo de Manila undergraduate and graduate students.

2. The game may be designed and implemented by an individual or a team of no more than 3 members.

3. The game has to be run from a web page, e.g. Flash, Unity, Java, etc.

4. The game's scope is limited to addition and subtraction of fractions. See http://teacherwiki.assistment.org/wiki/Skills/Addition_and_Subtraction_Fractions_(280)

5. All games must be original works free from copyright infringement.

6. All games must be designed for American sub-urban, middle school students. Adult and mature themes are discouraged.

7. To register for the competition, please email

team name
names, year levels, courses, email addresses and contact numbers of all team member
the game title
60-100 word description of the game concept

to Ma. Mercedes Rodrigo (mrodrigo@ateneo.edu) of the Department of Information Systems and Computer Science by August 15.

8. By October 1, 12 nn EST, participating teams must email a URL of their game. The email should also contain the game title and 200- to 250-word description of the game rules and mechanics.

9. Each team is limited to one entry.

10. Once submitted, the game may not be modified.

11. The winning team will be announced by 1 November 2011.