Interesting Links 23 July 2012

I had a great week and a great weekend. Busy weekend with family which is the best way to spend the weekend. I’m late with today’s posts though but hopefully you’ll all forgive me.

The Microsoft Research Faculty Summit has put many of the talks from last week online. It’s not all heavy technology. Social awareness was a big theme this year. For example Research in Focus: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: The Role of Technology in Human Trafficking talks about using technology to fight human trafficking. And the Day 2 Closing Keynote: Rivers of Ice: Vanishing Glaciers of the Greater Himalaya was presented by the same person who created the amazing Imax movie about climbing Mount Everest. Some amazing photography and a close look at glaciers in the Himalayan region.

You can see far more videos from Microsoft Research at their video website. Check out the collections link and select Faculty Summit 2012 to see the full list of sessions from this year’s event.

If you into space at all you are probably aware that on August 4th the latest NASA robot to land on Mars is scheduled to land. Well the @koduteam that there is a Kodu Mars Edition coming soon! In the mean time there is a Mars rover game on Xbox Live. I’m testing the Kodu Mars edition now and it looks like fun.

A new CSTA publication, Computer Science K–8: Building a Strong Foundation is ready for download at the CSTA web site. if you are all interested in K-8 computer science education this is a must read.

The cure for the CS Educator Blues is a post about the recent  CS & IT conference on the CSTA Blog. It’s a great example of one of the wonderful things about this conference for CS teachers.

FUSE Labs of Microsoft Research invites students to participate in their student social media advisor program.