Author: valeriu

Drifting Icebergs Are Hotspots of Life

Icebergs that break off Antarctica and drift away turn out to be hotspots of life in the cold southern ocean, researchers report. Climate warming has led to an increase in the number of icebergs breaking away from the Antarctic in recent years, and a team of researchers set out to study the impact the giant ice chunks were having on the environment.

Dubai’s Burj al-Taqa: A Zero-Energy Tower in the Desert

Article PhotoGiven the rate of growth in Dubai, we’re seeing an endless stream of media reports about building plans and strategies there. At Worldchanging, we’ve also had a relatively consistent trickle of news about Dubai and the UAE in general, but the green and sustainable projects we talk about here represent only a tiny fraction of the total activity there, most of which races ahead on unsustainable ground. Little by little, though, an assortment of models are emerging, from office parks to housing developments to skyscrapers. It may not be long before the UAE has a full package of potential sustainable designs for future architects to learn and work from. One new arrival on the scene comes from a German architect, Eckhard Gerber, who currently holds CAD drawings for the tallest zero-emissions, zero-energy skyscraper in the world. As Der Spiegel reports, the Burj al-Taqa (“Energy Tower”), is “a giant 68-story building projected to rise to a lofty height of 322 meters (1,056 feet), which would make it number 22 on the list of the world’s tallest buildings.” Together with engineering company, DS-Plan, Eckhard designed a cylindrical building in order to expose the least possible area of the façade to sunlight, and… (more)

(Posted by Sarah Rich in Green Building at 3:04 PM)

Education: Connecting the Lonely Profession

Article Photoby guest contributor, Suzie Boss: Teaching has long been known as the lonely profession. The way many schools are still organized keeps teachers behind classroom doors, isolated from their colleagues. It’s not a set-up that helps good ideas travel. When new teachers bail out of the profession—as nearly a third do within their first three years of teaching—they cite isolation as one of the top reasons for their early exit. If you listen to conversations taking place out in the blogosphere, however, you get more hopeful about the possibility for grassroots change in the teaching world. Edubloggers are having robust discussions about how and why they teach, and what strategies and new tools will help their students learn. Online, teachers are able to swap ideas and improve instruction by getting critical feedback from peers—improving curriculum in much the same way that open source developers improve software. Vicki Davis, known internationally as the author of Cool Cat Teacher Blog, goes as far as to suggest, “Teachers who innovate have a professional responsibility to blog. It makes the whole community better.” Wesley Fryer, author of the award-winning Moving at the Speed of Creativity and a self-described education “change agent,” says the edublogosphere… (more)

(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Education at 2:17 PM)