Dancing with the Stars (Astronomically)

Three Plumas County communities – Greenville, Portola, and Quincy – are participating in a groundbreaking astronomy research project supported by the National Science Foundation.  The RECON project is studying objects that orbit the sun out beyond the planet Neptune. To study these distant faint objects, citizen-scientists in each community use project-supplied equipment to record them when they move in front of stars – this is called an occultation – when they literally “dance with the stars”.  RECON stands for Research and Education Cooperative Occultation Network.  In addition to the research, education is a key objective of the project.  Science teachers at Quincy High School, Portola High School, Plumas Charter School in Greenville, and Feather River College are all part of RECON.

Dr. John Keller

Dr. John Keller, a planetary scientist and astronomy educator in the Physics Department at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, is one of the two principal investigators leading the RECON project.  On Thursday evening, September 12^th  Dr. Keller will give a free public lecture at Feather River College about the RECON project along with representatives from the Plumas County teams.  The presentation will begin at 7:30 p.m. in room 103 on the lower level of the new FRC Learning Resource Center.  Following the lecture attendees are invited to a “star party” at the FRC observatory.  Interested people will also be given the opportunity to sign up for an ongoing Community Education class that will meet every other week from September 26th through December 5^th taught by Charles Arrowsmith, the astronomy instructor at FRC, and Michelle Callahan of Portola High School.  

Those who take the RECON community education course will learn more about the science behind the project, how to use the equipment, and how to analyze the results.  They will be able and encouraged to participate in the ongoing observation campaigns as a part of their community team.  The community education class is being offered free of charge to qualifying high school students and for only $20 to the general public.

You can read more about the RECON project at http://tnorecon.net/ and you can email RECON.Quincy@gmail.com for information about the class.  Quincy RECON is also on Google+.

Pineapple Rainbow

The rainbow left behind in the wake of the Pineapple Express.

From near the observatory on the FRC campus looking across the soccer field toward the Equine Center.

More Than Books

College should be about a lot more than book-learning.

And here is more from the "million acre classroom" at FRC.

Weekend Class: Beginner Whitewater Kayaking from ORL Feather River College on Vimeo.

More on Facebook and at www.saylorflett.com.

Million Acre Classroom

Feather River College
Outdoor Recreation Leadership

Leveling the Green

Replacing the topsoil that was sequestered during construction of the new Learning Resource Center at Feather River College.

In the Spring the Green should be green again.

Follow this link back to the LRC construction thread.

Tag

This morning, the FRC Intro to Wildlife class captured a deer and outfitted her with a GPS/VHF collar. (She now has other pretty jewelry too – two ear tags). They are working with the California Department of Fish and Game to learn how to capture, handle, and collar deer in order to investigate how far our campus deer stray from the hay barn. :-J

It was a great experience for students who set up drive nets, waited until a deer wandered into the area, then chased her into the nets where she became temporarily entangled. They ‘mugged’ her (wrestled her down, blindfolded and hobbled her), then took blood samples, body measurements, vital signs, sampled the insects on her body (mostly ticks), collected hair samples, ear-tagged, and collared her. If you see a deer with a big fancy necklace, you’ll know why! Another capture attempt is planned in a couple of weeks.

Credit:

Darla S. DeRuiter, Ph.D.
Environmental Studies & Outdoor Recreation Leadership
Feather River College
570 Golden Eagle Drive
Quincy, CA 95971

No Permit

On every campus I know, parking spaces are at a premium and enforcement can be brutal. You may get away with cutting a class or two, and cheating on a test will get you an "F", but taking a full-time faculty parking spot has serious consequences. :-J

Post no Posts

You may post your sign on facebook, but you can't post it here.

Almost Done

The new Learning Resource Center at Feather River College is nearing completion. Ironic that while the building was being constructed the politicos have been deconstructing the educational system around it.

Link to previous construction photo thread, or search campus.

Rafters

A rafter of turkeys outside my classroom window early Friday morning.

Taking advantage of the recent good weather, the windows are in and shingles are being put on the rafters of the Learning Resource Center.

See previous LRC posts for more of the story.

Critical Path

During the last week of the Fall 2010 semester, the windows were finally being installed in the new Learning Resource Center under construction at Feather River College. If you have followed the sequence of previous LRC posts, you may realize that the building was originally to have been completed this month and occupied next semester. Sadly (and expensively) the plan was disrupted by some two-bit criminals.

What happened was that metal thieves stole the aluminum from the window manufacturer that was supposed to be used in the window frames. The manufacturer had to re-order it. Since no one can afford to hold any inventory any more, the custom-made aluminum had to be redone (and probably shipped here on a slow boat from you-know-where). Of course with no windows the building was open to the weather, so the interior finishing work could not begin. Also as it turns out, the flashing could not be installed without the windows; and the design specified that the flashing had to be installed before the roof could be finished. So now that the windows are finally here, things can proceed.

But wait, it is not that simple, because now the crappy-rainy-snowy-cold weather is here. Not the kind of weather you want for roof installation. The ideal weather occurred three months ago, exactly when the windows would have / should have been installed.

[Insert tongue in cheek now.]

So some guys with a hacksaw and a little time made a little money at the expense of education. Of course, it's not really their fault. This was the fault of the environmentalists! Those people who want to sustain the only planet we have, have built an infrastructure to encourage scrap of all kinds, especially metal, to be recycled for reuse. Furthermore they pay people do what people ought to do for free, make the small effort to recycle things that actually are scrap. So these entrepreneurs have made a business of creating scrap. Brilliant in that the only capital equipment needed was that hacksaw (which was probably acquired with a five-finger discount coupon from an unsuspecting supplier). So they are not criminals. They are just small businessmen creating jobs and helping to reduce unemployment. If they are ever caught, they should be praised for doing their part to beat the recession and kick the economy someplace, and they should be released rather than incarcerated. In the unlikely event that they are caught and convicted, we no doubt will punish them severely by providing them with comprehensive medical coverage, three daily meals, housing, and an immersion course that will teach them how to take their business to the next level upon their release. [Remove tongue from cheek.]

Water Added

Remember to Click for Quincy.

September's progress on the new Learning Resource Center at FRC.

Previous post.

Click for Quincy

The Feather River College Writing Club took a wild card chance and applied for our community college to be one of the stops Ariana Huffington would do on her national book tour for her new book Third World America. Ariana stated that she would make an unscheduled (and free) stop in a region in the US that was economically depressed (this is Q-topia, not utopia). Out of over 200 submissions, Huffington Post picked the application for FRC to be in the final 15. Currently there is voting on the Huffington Post website underway, Please vote (for us)!

Margaret Garcia wrote the application, and after you have voted, you should click over to her blog, Tales of a Sierra Madre, to read her latest poems and essays. (Note to readers, her blog does not have a full RSS feed, so in a reader you only see the first few lines of poetry all smashed together, so you actually need to visit the site.) As a rule I object to partial feeds (read why here), but I think her work is worth the extra click.

I know that this post skirts the edge of the Ad-Free Blog logo on the left. Think of this as an ad for Q-topia rather than the book. I can't say that I am a huge fan of Ariana Huffington, but she is clearly in the vanguard of challenging the entrenched old media establishment in what I consider a fundamentally positive way. Even though I may or may not agree with everything she says, I do listen to her point of view.

Thanks for your votes! Wish us luck!

Solar Lunch

Summer Progress

The new Learning Resource Center under construction at Feather River College. The previous posting was at the end of May just before Summer break. Fall classes at FRC start on Monday.

Equine

Snapshots of the annual production horse sale by the Equine Studies Program at Feather River College.

Pictures by Bill Peters, Amberley Eck, and Daniella Revers.

Raising the Roof

End of May photos of the FRC Learning Resource Center construction.

Previous LRC post.

Learning Steel

Structural steel rising for the FRC Learning Resource Center.

Previous LRC post.

Deer students

Spring break on campus.

Not Yet Spring Break

Campus preparations for Spring Break next week. We're ready already!

07:45 AM - Walking up the hill before class.











Looks to me like North America between the clouds.

09:15 AM - Back down the hill after class.