October 17, 1997
For more information on these science news and feature story tips, please
contact the public information officer at the end of each item at (703)
292-8070. Editor: Bill Noxon
Contents of this News Tip:
Sandy Madison hopes to increase the percentage of young women she sees
in her introductory computer class at University of Wisconsin, Stevens
Point. She is designing a summer program for high school teachers and
girls with the help of a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant.
"Girls don't see themselves as belonging in the culture of computer
science," Madison says, noting that only one-quarter of her introductory
students are women.
Hoping to reverse this trend, Madison's program -- which will be repeated
twice next summer -- will bring about a dozen high school computer teachers
to the campus for a week to learn computer information concepts. They'll
learn how to use the Internet in their classes and receive training in
gender issues. In a following week, 25 high school girls will be taught
by the teachers, guided by college professors.
Female college students will mentor the high school girls, and professionals
in the computing and engineering fields will talk about their jobs.
"It's forming a community," Madison said. The high school teachers
will each receive a small grant to initiate a gender-related computer
project, and will stay in touch through web pages and e-mail. [Beth
Gaston]
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The 1999 change from Pascal to C++ programming language for high school
advanced placement (AP) computer science tests means that most AP teachers
nationwide will need training in C++ and associated teaching techniques.
In the process of teaching teachers new programming language, Allan
Fisher at Carnegie Mellon University and Jo Sanders at the Washington
Research Institute in Seattle are also incorporating gender equity techniques
that will become a systematic part of the teaching process in computer
science. The goal of this NSF-funded training is to encourage women to
stay in computer science.
Fisher and Sanders expect to reach 20 percent of the nation's estimated
1,500 AP computer science teachers nationwide with the new programming
language. By including the gender equity material in a class most of the
teachers will need, Fisher and Sanders hope to reach a broader range of
teachers. The material will be presented in a specific context, which
may help the teachers better incorporate new techniques into their lesson
plans.
Girls are usually well-represented in early computer science classes,
Fisher said, but the numbers drop off in more advanced classes. Of the
approximately 11,000 students who take the computer science advanced placement
exam each year, only about 16 percent are female. [Beth Gaston]
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The American shad can detect high-frequency sounds, an adaptation that
may allow the fish to escape its principal predator, dolphins.
This conclusion,
from NSF-funded researchers at the University of Maryland at College Park,
documents the ability of the American shad, a member of the herring family,
to detect sounds with a frequency as high as 180 kilohertz.
In the study, scientist Arthur Popper and colleagues speculate that
the ability to hear high-pitched sounds in this range enables the fish
to detect the ultrasonic clicking sounds that dolphins use for echolocation.
The presence of this ability in American shad, and perhaps in other shad
and herrings, may be an example of convergent evolution, the biologists
say. This adaptation in fish is similar to that in certain moths and other
insects that can detect the ultrasonic sounds of their bat predators.
The response to such sounds, whether in shad or insects, is escape.
Results of this work may help increase the effectiveness of efforts
to use sound to protect shad and related species from being sucked into
the cooling water intakes of power plants. Ultrasonic sounds are already
used to keep fish away from such intakes, and knowledge of the range of
sound shad can hear may make it possible to more effectively use this
protective technique. [Cheryl Dybas]
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