The Top 50 Finalists for the Global Teacher Prize, 2025

 This program, run by the Varkey Foundation in the United Kingdom, has become known as the 'Nobel Prize for Teaching.' Any teacher on the planet can apply or be nominated, and ultimately one teacher wins a $1 million award! Each year, thousands of teachers apply, and the Top 50 teachers in the world for that year are determined and named Top 50 Finalists. Someone from that group will win the prize, but all 50 will be part of the Global Teacher Prize Ambassador Program. 

The Top 50 Finalists cohorts can be found here for each year it has been run. Yours truly is in the first group of finalists from 2015. The photo below is the group of American teachers from our summit and conference in Dubai, from 2017. 

Climate change - 2024 hottest year on record, and first to be 1.5-degrees C above preindustrial period

 Well, the goal of the Paris Climate Accords (signed in 2016) was to prevent global temperatures from going above 1.5-degrees Celcius, but in 2024 the world has exceeded that level for the first time. If you are into climate science and the data behind all this, check out the 2024 Climate Summary published by Copernicus Climate Change Service. 

The last 10 years have been the 10 hottest years on record, which goes back some 150 years or so. Another telling set of measurements has been surface temperatures of our oceans, which have been rising annually, as well (note the attached graph, and how the last two years really stand out). Ocean temps are important because the hotter the water gets, the more evaporation occurs, and this fuels storms such as hurricanes/cyclones around the world. This is why storms are more powerful, on average, than in the past. 

I personally worry about losing another 4 years of any progress regarding climate change, as the new administration's energy policy goes back to an old, archaic and dangerous chant of "Drill, drill, drill." Without US leadership, it is more unlikely the rest of the world will be able to do much. But let's keep reminding the world climate change is real, it is already causing major problems in every region of the world and costing hundreds of billions of dollars in damage and human life (as I write this, the Los Angeles area is burning, with loss of life and tens of billions of dollars in losses, for example)

A Great Headline - Let's see how it plays out in the next 8 or so years: Commercial Fusion Power

 A claim has now been made that the world's first commercial fusion reactor (that can plug into the power grid) will be online in "the early 2030s", in Richmond, Virginia. 

THIS WILL BE A BIG DEAL if successful! But for decades, scientists have made claims fusion would be available in ten years, and it is not clear if these power companies and startups will be ready in a few years, but let's certainly hope they or someone else will be successful soon. Should be interesting! 

New quasiparticles found in all magnetic materials

 Going into the 2nd semester, the seniors will be changing focus from electricity to magnetism. This is a new discovery about the very nature of magnetism, and is still trying to be fully understood and explored. It is a quasiparticle found roaming in magnetic materials of all kinds, and at all temperatures. 

In the coming years, we will almost certainly hear a LOT more about this, and how new applications and understandings of magnetism develop, in industries such as computer engineering and how memory and other aspects of computers work. 

High School students find new trigonometric proofs for Pythagorean theorem, using trig

 Check out this paper by two high school students, who found trig-based proofs of the Pythagorean theorem, once thought to not be possible! Very cool!! 

See the Science News article about this here. 

Summary of all 2024 Nobel Prizes

 This is the summary page for all 2024 Nobel Prizes. Enjoy! 

Nobel in Economics - why are some countries wealthy, ,others poor?

 This is a summary paper about the Nobel winners in economics (2 from MIT, 1 from U. of Chicago), who contribute to our understanding of how and why some countries such as the USA have accumulated massive wealth, while many other countries have not and whose citizens are sometimes desperately poor. 

Generally, it largely depends on the types of institutions developed in a country - the more inclusive the institutions, such as in countries leaning towards or practicing democracy, the more wealth is generated and the higher the GDP per capita. If institutions are extractive, such as in oligarchies and authoritarian countries, the less wealth per citizen, and whatever wealth there is tends to be concentrated with the few in power. 

A good Equipotential Line simulation - Thanks to Desmos

 Equipotential lines and surfaces are a big thing in electrostatics. Graphically, these provide a way of trying to visualize an abstract quantity such as voltage, and mathematically it makes use of a gradient -                                                                     E-field = dV/dr

The graphing program and site DESMOS has a wonderful visualization and simulator for this. We just wanted to be sure everyone has access to this, and hopefully it will help make sense out of this abstract, mathematical concept. 

                                                                      From xmPhysics

Projectile Pollen possible in certain plant to aid in pollinating female flowers

 What great timing, where an article in Science News about a projectile method of spreading pollen for a certain type of plant, came out while we are studying projectile motion. 

The Brazilian flower Hypenea macrantha has evolved a catapult-like mechanism that can launch its pollen when hummingbirds have their beaks in the flower, sipping out nectar. This does two things: it helps knock other, competitor flower's pollen off the beaks of hummingbirds, and then increases the amount of the flower's own pollen that sticks to the beak, thus increasing the odds of having its pollen transferred to a female flower. Nature is awesome! 

AP Scores being inflated on some of the exams

 It appears that the College Board has changed the way some of the AP subject exams are scored. For example, the percentage of students getting scores of 4 or 5 on the US History, US Government, and European History nearly doubled from 2023 to 2024. Others, like Chemistry and Biology, have seen dramatic recalibrations a couple years ago. 

Grade inflation is something that has dramatically risen since the Covid shutdowns, mostly done to help alleviate the severe and oftentimes traumatic stresses that were present for everyone, both students and adults. But as we have come out of the shutdowns, perhaps a key question should be "is getting a B or C the end of the world?" It doesn't make any sense if everyone gets an A in classes if they clearly have not mastered much of the material...'average' is a concept that has seemingly been dismissed. On an AP exam, a score of 4 or 5 is supposed to represent high levels of mastery of the subject. Perhaps we all have done ourselves a disservice by boosting up the acceptance of mediocrity and confusing it with mastery and excellence. Where this tends NOT to happen, though, is when trying to get jobs ultimately. 

So let's work on the excellence part of all this throughout the school year, and have some fun learning all about how our world and universe work fundamentally, and become excellent problem solvers who will have the ability to truly fix some of the problems in the world and discover new bits of knowledge that can be useful in our understanding of life and nature! The scores on tests will come along for the ride, and if we are successful building up our knowledge and skills, they will be representative of our excellence. BUT, it is also true that it is likely NOT EVERYONE WILL GET THERE! AND THAT'S OK! We all learn at different rates and have different strengths and weaknesses, so sometimes it takes many of us longer than others to master topics and courses. If some of us need to take some classes over when in college, THAT IS OK, TOO! You will be well-prepared for that scenario because of the background from the high school course, and AP classes are called 'Advanced' for a reason - they are challenging! 

Let's have fun learning, together, and see where it leads!