A Fairy Tale Rediscovered

As a child, one of my fondest memories was going to the library and walking through the aisles full of books, running my fingers over the spines. As a voracious reader, I consumed anything I could get my hands on. At that time I usually read novels, but the vivid illustrations from picture books begged me to open them all too often. One of my favorite picture books was The Golden Mare, the Firebird, and the Magic Ring by Ruth Sanderson, a rendition of a classic Russian folktale in rich paintings and thick pages. If all the books in the world were to disappear, this is the book I would want to save. 

I heard the tale initially from my father, who told me the fairy tale as a bedtime story, but as I stumbled upon it a second time in the library, the story was retold – this time with colorful paintings of a huntsman as he runs away from an evil Tsar, searching for Princess Vasilisa. My tiny fingers roamed over the golden fields of Imperial Russia, traced the scarlet wings of the firebird and dipped into the icy waves of the Barents Sea as I followed the huntsman on his quest. Now I could touch palpable images of a tale from so long ago. As a nine-year-old, I was entranced by the vivid colors as much as the simple plot of the fairy tale.

Eventually I moved on past picture books, delving into chaptered novels, and then hundred-paged trilogies and chronicles. But even then, I remembered the brilliant colors of The Golden Mare, the Firebird, and the Magic Ring, and in my mind, I imagined the scenes of whatever book I was reading as vividly as the images from the Firebird picture book were.

And then in my freshmen year of high school, I joined a local orchestra and there we played the Firebird suite, composed by the Russian composer Stravinsky as the score for the Firebird ballet. Here, I rediscovered the Firebird for the third time, through music. It took little effort to see the footsteps of the huntsman, tip-toeing through the forest to find the firebird as plucked bass notes filled the air, and the supremacy of the greedy Tsar as the timpani rolled and the cymbal crashed.

Now, along with the words from my father and the illustrations from the story book, I put together the Firebird as I envision it – a theatrical mélange of sights and sounds woven together to form the folktale I love so dearly. For me, the story was no longer just words in the air, but a tale engaging all of my senses.  

 Walking through the library now, I spy The Golden Mare, the Firebird, and the Magic Ring, and ten years after I heard the story orally for the first time, I thumb through the pages. As a teenager, the premise of the story is simple enough, and yet I’m still drawn to the deep colors of the firebird’s feathers, the pale folds of the princess’s dress. The story is told plainly yet beautifully, embodying the rudiments of a fairy tale.

As I read, I can hear a cascade of violins as the golden mare trots through an ecru field, the lament of an oboe as the huntsman dives into the freezing ocean. And when the huntsman finally marries the Princess, I hear Stravinsky’s trumpets ringing. As the story draws to an end, the firebird rests in the corner of the last page, waiting for the next time someone will open the book.

 

An Interdisciplinary Journey: A Brief Look at Coding and Machine-Learning in Genetics

An Interdisciplinary Journey

A Brief Look at Coding and Machine-Learning in Genetics

Melba Nuzen, Scripps Ranch High School

In today’s world of technology, the road to discovery is paved with complex, multifaceted problems. To begin looking for solutions, we must find equally complex methods to tackle these challenges.

Our road was paved in the 1950s when people first discovered DNA as the blueprint for our human systems—a design that remained unchanged throughout our lives. However, as research progressed, we discovered that our characteristics rely on more than just the nucleotides of DNA; there are certain chemical compounds and proteins that can modify the expression of DNA, collectively referred to as the epigenome.

The epigenome can increase the production of specific proteins or turn certain genes on or off when necessary [1]. All of this occurs without altering the actual DNA code itself; epigenetic proteins instead interact with DNA. Recently, a collection of institutions have begun exploring epigenetics in the field of cancer research.

The connection between cancer and epigenetics is fairly simple: the epigenome includes proteins called transcription factors that can inhibit gene expression by blocking DNA transcription. This can stop cells from multiplying by altering gene expression—if certain genes aren’t expressed, the cell cannot divide. Modulation of transcription factors is essential to the proliferation of cancer cells, formation of tumors, and tumor metastasis to other organs, which produces secondary tumors [2]. In a study done in mice, researchers sampled various epigenomes and found a group of enhancer genes called metastatic variant enhancer loci (Met-VELs) that are frequently located near bone cancer genes [3]. The activation of these enhancer genes was required for the formation of secondary tumors, while inhibiting transcription factors that coordinated with Met-VELs interrupted metastasis. Ultimately, this decreased the growth of cancerous tumors and prevented relapse in mice.

Of course, there are many more variables to test before such research can be extended to humans. But the fundamental takeaway from this example is clear: a new scientific discovery leads to a better understanding of genetics, which inspires solutions to challenges that have major impacts on humanity.

So how do these discoveries, understandings, and solutions come about? A variety of fields, such as artificial intelligence, mathematical statistics, and computer programming are combined in careers like biostatistics and bioinformatics to address some of these challenges.

Let’s take a closer look at the previously mentioned study of bone cancer in mice. The activation of Met-VELs by transcription factors was just one of thousands of interactions found when epigenetic proteins interacted with enhancer genes. So how do we begin discovering what each protein does when it binds to its respective gene? And before we tackle that question, how do we even map out DNA strands and their epigenetic counterparts?

To sort through the billions of base-pairs in the human genome—which translates to millions of bytes of data—scientists turn to computers, or more specifically, programming languages. For example, take R, a powerful language designed for data analysis. Counting the number of nucleotides in a string of DNA would look something like this:

library(stringr)

seq1 <- “TCTTGGATCA”

count1A <- str_count(seq1, c(“A”))

count1C <- str_count(seq1, c(“C”))

count1G <- str_count(seq1, c(“G”))

count1T <- str_count(seq1, c(“T”))

Six lines of code tell the computer to read through a string of characters, seq1, and count all of the As, Cs, Gs, and Ts. Using the library stringr, and the unction str_count, this code creates four variables that hold the number of times their respective letter appears in seq1.

To compare DNA before and after a mutation, the code would resemble this:

library(stringr)

seq1 <- “TCTTGGATCA”

count1A <- str_count(seq1, c(“A”))

seq2 <- “TCATGGATCA”

count2A <- str_count(seq2, c(“A”))

if ( count1A == count2A ) {

     print(“true”)

}

This program compares two strands of DNA, seq1 and seq2. Using the process described  above, the computer generates two variables that represent the amount of “A” characters found in seq1 and seq2. Then, the code compares those two variables, returning true  if there is an equal number of “A” characters found in both sequences. This idea can be implemented for all four bases to compare much lengthier DNA strands and determine whether or not strands contain the same number of specific bases.

Of course, these are simple examples to illustrate how coding algorithms can be utilized. With a few lines of code, computers can analyze millions of strands of DNA in many types of coding languages. Now, the question to answer is how DNA interacts with proteins, and what overall effect that has on a biological system. For this complex problem, we venture off the beaten path to a more complex solution: artificial intelligence.

When AI is mentioned, images of self-driving cars and evil robots often come to mind. However, artificial intelligence can play a large role in the field of bioinformatics, particularly in genetics. Machine learning is one such application of artificial intelligence that specializes in the independent analysis of data by algorithms. This will be useful for looking at transcription factors and their roles in cell development [4].

Within the subfield of machine learning, there are two general methods for addressing problems: supervised and unsupervised learning. As the name suggests, supervised learning teaches the machine how to analyze data by inputting annotated data points to train the machine to recognize an expected output. In the case of epigenetics, this means training and testing a machine learning model to recognize enhancer genes by inputting a series of known enhancer genes and non-enhancer genes; this way, the model can make an educated guess as to whether or not a new piece of data is an enhancer gene or not [5]. If we give our model examples of DNA that contain transcription start sites (TSS) as well as DNA that does not contain TSSs, the algorithm will theoretically be able to recognize a pattern and then find TSSs itself.

Figure 1: Supervised Learning in recognizing transcription start sites in DNA [6]

In regards to epigenetics, the model would sift through megabytes of DNA to pick out notable genes of interest, allowing for more time to be allocated toward concentrating on analyzing how the DNA interacts with transcription factors [6].

On the other hand, unsupervised learning comes into play when it’s preferable to avoid giving a model pre-determined labels or groups. An application of this type of learning could be determining the functions and effects of specific transcription initiation complexes. Given enhancers and their respective proteins along with their impact on associated functions, a machine learning model can group proteins together based on similar effects. This occurs in one of two ways: generative or discriminative modelling. The former type of modelling groups data based on similar characteristics, whereas the latter draws a boundary between data points [6]. When dealing with unknown variables, such as the functions of proteins, discriminative modeling is used more often, since scientists have few predetermined groups to classify proteins into.

Figure 2: Unsupervised Learning in grouping data [6]

With these methods, the machine can then conclude that a certain group of enhancers and their epigenetic counterparts halt the proliferation of cancer cells, as seen in Met-VELs.

Though our journey, filled with pit-stops at various science disciplines, took us on a winding and tangled road, the combination of coding, machine-learning, and genetics has led us to a fascinating discovery full of potential. But this explanation covers only the basics of such a revelation; in reality, studying epigenetics and cancer cells is just one application of the interdisciplinary study. At the moment, combining fields of interest is the road leading us toward the future. Our journey will continue as we synthesize a variety of concepts to take on complex, ever-diversifying problems and explore new solutions that will impact humanity for years to come.

References

[1] Epigenomics Fact Sheet. National Human Genome Research Institute website. https://www.genome.gov/27532724/epigenomics-fact-sheet/. Accessed February 8, 2018.

[2] Davis CP. Understanding Cancer: Metastasis, Stages of Cancer, and More. OnHealth. https://www.onhealth.com/content/1/cancer_types_treatments. Accessed February 8, 2018.

[3] Researchers Inhibit Cancer Metastases via Novel Steps - Blocking Action of Gene Enhancers Halts Spread of Tumor Cells. Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine website. http://casemed.case.edu/cwrumed360/news-releases/release.cfm?news_id=1026&news_category=8. Accessed February 12, 2018.

[4] Marr B. What Is The Difference Between Artificial Intelligence And Machine Learning? Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2016/12/06/what-is-the-difference-between-artificial-intelligence-and-machine-learning/#4dc79f282742. Published September 15, 2017. Accessed February 18, 2018.

[5] Marr B. Supervised V Unsupervised Machine Learning -- What's The Difference? Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2017/03/16/supervised-v-unsupervised-machine-learning-whats-the-difference/#5d786d6a485d. Published March 16, 2017. Accessed February 18, 2018.

[6] Libbrecht MW, Noble WS. Machine learning applications in genetics and genomics. Nature Reviews Genetics. 2015;16(6):321-332. doi:10.1038/nrg3920.

Deep Creek Hot Springs Hike and the History of Mathematics (Review of “How Not to Be Wrong”)

In my high school calculus class, many students find it difficult to remain perfectly attentive throughout each 45 minute lecture, taking notes on each problem while also engaging in class to answer questions or perhaps question the teacher. I am, of course, no exception to this rule.

In what I’ve learned from my 13 years in the American public education system (I did not, by the way, take any common core classes), the math education goes something like this: teacher lectures and does a few example problems, you the student independently do homework, review answers, take a test with slightly different questions, and then proceed to forget the majority of whatever you’ve just learned.

A few days ago, my class began delving deeper into the realm of limits and sequences. At one point in the lecture, my teacher interrupted to say something like this: all your life, you’ve been taught to do math, empirically. You may not have understood why to proceed a certain way when solving a test or understood which formula to use, but you begin learning some of these reasonings as you graduate from class to class.

Which I guess, makes sense.

But a while ago, someone had recommended to me a book entitled How Not to Be Wrong: the Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordan Ellenberg. I had read the introduction (only, yeah I know, I know) and wrote a review of the novel’s beginning anecdote, which can be found here.

Several months later, I decide to take a hike outside of San Bernardino, to a hot spring site in a place called Deep Creek Canyon.

The hike and subsequent adventure were actually wonderful: it felt so good to enjoy the absolute, irrevocable silence of the canyon -- no noise, traffic, or pollution -- so quiet you could only hear the blood rushing in your ears.

The springs themselves were a delight as well! After about an hour hike down into a canyon, we waded across a freezing stream to have lunch on some sun-drenched rocks overlooking the cold river. Afterwards, we alternated between the just-on-this-side-of-uncomfortable hot springs and the freezing creek, not unlike Japanese onsen. Someone had set up a slackline across the freezing river, which we took turns attempting to cross as well.

Where does the math come in? you might ask. Well, we used Newton’s Law of Cooling to calculate the rate at which our body temperature dropped after plunging into the mountaintop snow-cold water. Just kidding.

Hardly any math was used that day: we relished in the torpor of a hidden getaway in the middle of the desert, sprawling in the drowsy hot springs before feeling the adrenaline paramount to a freediver’s thrill at submerging in our icy creek.

But -- there was a lull in the middle of the day wherein my companion pulled out a new copy of a Cicero book, and I my iPhone, finally beginning to read Ellenberg again.

It didn’t feel like math.

Ellenberg explains one of the basic ideas in calculus: limits. He begins with explaining how early mathematicians found the number pi -- anecdotal style.

It’s not a strange concept to me -- irrational numbers. Pi, Euler’s number, and the like. But discovering irrational numbers? Basic human intuition understands the concept of whole numbers relatively easily. One toga, two goats, three laurel wreaths, four stuffed grape leaves. Half of a stuffed grape leaf may be easy to imagine. But 3.1415 grape leaves?

When graphing curves and parabolas in math, if you zoom in close enough to any curve, it resembles a line. In statistics, this method of representing data, known as linear regression, often simplifies trends when viewing data with a microscope -- that is, looking at only small chunks of data.

The legend Archimedes decided to find the area of a circle by inscribing other shapes, like squares, pentagons, and octagons, inside of a circle. The area of the polygon contained with the circle represents the area of a circle the more sides that polygon has.

For example, the area of an octagon within a circle better resembles the circle’s area than a square within a that same circle. Archimedes theorized that a circle was simply a polygon, and its area could be calculated by calculating the area of a polygon whose numbers of sides approaches infinity. Here’s a catchy slogan Ellenberg presents: “straight locally, curved globally.”

Math has this wonderful, complex, and quirky history seemingly irreconcilable with what I’ve learned in class, at least up until this year.

This year, I’ve had the pleasure of encountering several elegant equations, such as this one:

Euler’s equation uses two of the most irrational numbers, e and pi, as well as the imaginary i and 1 and 0.

It seems counterintuitive to read about math, but I think the introduction of mathematical ideas through anecdotes -- such as how Cauchy, a professor who both infuriated and inspired coworkers and students alike when he taught his freshmen students his own cutting edge take on calculus when the curriculum nearly the opposite -- makes math more approachable, less of a tool you use out of necessity and more of a concept you develop and harness as your own. It’s a living thing with its own history and archaic notions, an art form if you look at it a certain way as well. I’m sure many more complicated equations relating to earth and space are equally as deserving of awe. But for now, I’ll continue reading on.

Until then!

Old Films (To Me, Anyway. Review of "Lawrence of Arabia")

A vast expanse of land, colorless. Stretching across the horizon, as big as the sky.

The sun, setting slowly. In the distance, a tiny black figure appears, no larger than a dot caught between land and sky.

Enormous, sweeping scenes of landscape feature in this film -- swaths of sand, rolling dunes, and still silhouettes. Lawrence of Arabia is an epic: clocking in at nearly three hours, along with an intermission, and depicting a heroic quest across desert and sea.

When I first watched the movie, I realized that they don’t make movies the same way today: Lawrence is slow, heavy on dramatic landscape shots and succinct dialogue. There’s some quality of older films that’s unique: maybe the way people talk (which, by the way, I looked up and it’s this thing called the Mid-Atlantic accent, some weird synthesis of both British and American speech used primarily in Hollywood in the 20th century), the honey-slow and leisurely pace of sequences, or the long, drawn-out sprawl of the film itself.

I only knew about Lawrence of Arabia from the new, in comparison, film Prometheus, a part of the Alien franchise.

One of the main characters of Prometheus is this humanoid robot, David, who is obsessed with Lawrence of Arabia. David, like Lawrence, is caught in a no-man’s land: David is not completely human, but not entirely robot either, something like a shell which knows that it is empty; and Lawrence is no longer an Englishman when he travels to war, but is not truly an Arab either. Both are caught between two worlds, never quite fitting in -- a familiar, recurring theme in many movies.

But the languid torpor, the slow, sun-drenched scenes of Lawrence aren’t familiar at all to me. “Have you no fear, English?” Sherif Ali asks Lawrence upon their first meeting, to which Lawrence replies: “My fear is my concern.”

David’s obsession with Lawrence is perhaps understandable. The film is reminiscent of one of those epics you have to read for English in high school, maybe the Odyssey or Gilgamesh, a fantastic, convoluted and gripping tale of a hero’s journey, the meaning and moral of which still vaguely eludes me. It has this timeless quality to it, a sort of picturesque, idyllic voyage. Something about that level of unattainability -- the pedestal that Lawrence has been placed on (despite some of his flaws) -- attracts me, and reminds me of love stories almost, ones set in Italy or France thirty or fourty years ago. There’s something about the idea of an epic perfection, of sunlight and honey and the blurred, oil-painting quality of memories.

Of course, these depictions are romanticized and dramaticized, but like Tim O’brien’s reasoning in The Things They Carried, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the emotions and memories evoked are meaningless.

 

Either way, watching these old Hollywood films is fascinating. Next up on my list, The Guns of Navarone!

The Things That Carried Them (Review of Tim O'brien's "The Things They Carried")

One of my goals for 2018 is to read more. Though I’ve been only vaguely successful so far, one novel that I’ve read recently comes to mind.

The Things They Carried is a compilation of short stories written by Tim O’brien, spanning the life of the author in a work of metafiction, wherein the author and the narrator often become one and the same. The work deals with the Vietnam War and its aftermath. However, there are no “Saving Private Ryan”-esque scenes of blood and gore. The short stories, poignant and achronological, together patch together a quilt of what daily life might’ve been for a soldier in the war. Here are two of my favorite passages from the book:

To generalize about war is like generalizing about peace. Almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true. At its core, perhaps, war is just another name for death, and yet any soldier will tell you, if he tells you the truth, that proximity to death brings with it a corresponding proximity to life. After a firefight, there is always the immense pleasure of aliveness. The trees are alive. The grass, the soil -- everything. All around you things are purely living, and you among them, and the aliveness makes you tremble. You feel an intense, out-of-the-skin awareness of your living self -- your truest self, the human being you want to be and then become by the force of wanting it. In the midst of evil you want to be a good man. You want decency. You want justice and courtesy and human concord, things you never knew you wanted. There is a kind of largeness to it, a kind of godliness. Though it’s odd, you’re never more alive than when you’re almost dead. You recognize what’s valuable. Freshly, as if for the first time, you love what’s best in yourself and in the world, all that might be lost. At the hour of dusk you sit at your foxhole and look out on a wide river turning pinkish red, and at the mountains beyond, and although in the morning you must cross the river and go into the mountains and do terrible things and maybe die, even so, you find yourself studying the fine colors on the river, you feel wonder and awe at the setting of the sun, and you are filled with a hard, aching love for how the world could be and always should be, but now is not (O’brien 77).

In this paragraph, O’brien opens with two parallel statements: “Almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true.” This parallelism repeats itself through the paragraph to bring war and death as well as peace and fiction close together so that O’brien and the reader may compare them. Parallelism in the sentences regarding proximity to life and death represent the thin boundary between the two; O’brien reflects his words’ meaning in their structure and arrangement.

Furthermore, he repeats the phrase “you want” several times, contrasting a curt sentence of “You want decency” with the polysyndeton of the following sentence, highlighting the list of things that a soldier desires in a war, and which the rest of the novel reveals as what actually happens in a war. His three-word sentence of “You want decency” underscores the idea that all of the other short stories in The Things They Carried show that there is no decency or fairness, that such a huge disparity exists between what the soldiers wish the war were and what it actually is. O’brien’s polysyndeton represents the enormous list of things the soldiers wish they had: and and and signifies the endless quality of the things they desire.

O’brien also employs irony in his oxymoronic statement: “You’re never more alive than when you’re almost dead”, which serves to again underscore the interconnected relationship between life and death. In the final sentence of the quote, O’brien juxtaposes the “fine colors” of the earth and his wonder and awe at the land with the death and indecency and violence and cruelty of the war. He depicts beauty and pain as two sides of the same coin: in the war, in the face of such terrible things, soldiers recognize the beauty surrounding them, because without that proximity to cruelty and death, they cannot realize how close they are to life. O'brien brings both life and death as well as beauty and ugliness together here in a loose sentence to emphasize the rambling nature of a soldier's thoughts, long winded and meandering as the soldier wonders about the effects of the war.

On a personal note, this paragraph also reminds me of an article I recently read about free-drivers. Biologically speaking, there isn’t a way for people to free-dive (the definition of which is swimming to an extreme depth underwater without help from any kind of breathing apparatus) beyond depths of around 100 meters. From a strictly factual perspective, past that depth, scientists understood that divers’ lungs would be crushed.

And yet the divers have survived and thrived in these depths -- because of mindset and mentality. According to such divers, their drive and their grit pushes them past this physical barrier. According to such divers, coming back from a diver and taking a breath of air again feels like breathing for the first time, like being reborn.

Here is the second passage from The Things They Carried:

Often in a true war story there is not even a point, or else the point doesn’t hit you until twenty years later, in your sleep, and you wake up and shake your wife and start telling the story to her, except when you get ot the end you’ve forgotten the point again. And then for a long time you lie there watching the story happen in your head. You listen to your wife’s breathing. The war’s over. You close your eyes. You take a feeble swipe in the dark and think, Christ, what’s the point? …

I’ll picture Rat Kiley’s face, his grief, and I’ll think, You dumb cooze.

Because she wasn’t listening.

            It wasn’t a war story. It was a love story.

But you can’t say that. All you can do is tell it one more time, patiently, adding and subtracting, making up a few things to get at the real truth. No Mitchell Sanders, you tell her. No Lemon, no Rat Kiley. No trail junction. No baby buffalo. No vines or moss or white blossoms. Beginning to end, you tell her, it’s all made up. Every goddamn detail -- the mountains and the river and especially that poor dumb baby buffalo. None of it happened. None of it. And even if it did happen, it didn’t happen in the mountains, it happened in this little village on the Batangan Peninsula, and it was raining like crazy, and one night a guy named Stink Harris woke up screaming with a leech on his tongue. You can tell a true war story if you just keep on telling it.

And in the end, of course, a true war story is never about the war. It’s about the sunlight. It’s about the special war that dawn spreads out on a river when you know you must cross the river and march into the mountains and do things you are afraid to do. It’s about love and memory. It’s about sorrow. It’s about sisters who never write back and people who never listen (O’brien 79).

O’brien’s poignant imagery from this passage in the “How to Tell a True War Story” vignette foreshadows the way readers may reflect upon his stories in the future: he employs the second person to better emphasize the notion that any individual who has listened to a war story may wake up in the middle of the night, some years later, to reflect upon those events. In this passage, O’brien notes that it isn’t the specifics of a war story that make it evocative: his demonstration of the happening-truth being fictional -- he claims that there was “no Lemon, no Rat Kiley… it [was] all made up” -- underscores the fact that the story does not need to be true in order for it to be poignant (79). His statement that a “true war story is never about the war” suggests that the relevance of a war story lies not with the happening-truth or the historical facts, but instead with the emotions: “love and memory… sorrow,” and the tenacity of soldiers who view a beautiful dawn but must still “do things [they] are afraid to do” (80).

Though this passage takes place early on in the novel, in retrospect, O’brien insinuates that even if none of the events in his novel happened, it does not matter, because maybe it happened somewhere -- and the emotions that he and his soldiers felt were real. O’brien claims that the war is less about fighting and violence and more about people and how people can change or adapt to survive.

In the context of the novel as a whole, this passage is an explanation on behalf of O’brien to his audience, sharing his justification as to why he has changed such details and events in his book, as he readily admits in later chapters. The tendency of metafiction to blur the line between narrator and author comes into play here as O’brien defends himself in a way: he vindicates his warping of facts and his ambiguity in writing because he believes that it won’t matter which way he imparts the emotions. To him, the emotions are the story, and he hopes that these emotions and thoughts -- though the reader may not exactly know what they mean -- will resonate. And to some extent, that indescribable quality of a war story -- its ability to evoke such complex emotions and force you to wonder why? and “what’s the point?” -- reflects some part of the human condition, the unknowable aspect of life (like the mystery and tenacity of free-drivers, to name only one example) that, if known, would make the magic go away.

Sources:

“Scientists still don’t understand how freedivers can survive such crushing depths”

https://www.popsci.com/freedive-physiology-pressure?dom=flipboard&src=syn

The Things They Carried, Tim O’brien.

An Open Letter to the State Superintendent of Public Instruction

January 12, 2018

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson

℅ California Department of Education

1430 N Street

Sacramento, CA 95814-5901

Dear Tom Torlakson:

I’m writing to you as a senior in high school. As I’m sure you know, senior year can be stressful: there are AP tests, SATs and ACTs to be taken, teachers to talk to about letters of recommendation, grades to maintain, internships to interview for, extracurricular activities to juggle, and, of course, the all-important process of college applications.

As I start to prepare for college however, I’m beginning to question a lot of the opportunities and problems I see in this process. For example, as I finish SAT prep classes, I wonder: does the correlation between SAT scores and family income bother you? Does this mean that the SAT -- the standardized aptitude test -- actually measures wealth and not intelligence? How do you plan on addressing this discrepancy, if you view it as one? Recently, in San Diego, I’ve noticed a growth of prep academies such as Elite Educational Institute and Hamilton College Consulting -- which can cost upwards of $3,000 for a supplemental program.

Most of these companies cater to students in high-income areas such as Scripps Ranch and Torrey Pines. None of them can be found in locations near City Heights or El Cajon.

However, there are non-government resources that surpass these barriers. For example, Khan Academy has been very useful for many of my friends with fewer resources than I. As the head of the California Department of Education, encouraging teachers to utilize this resource -- and other resources like it -- and possibly even incorporating it into classrooms has many benefits for Californian students from low income families. Programs like Khan Academy sometimes even offer specialized courses to students, based on weak areas, as extrapolated from practice test results.

Another program that can be found in San Diego is TEALs. TEALS is a program supported by Microsoft Philanthropies. It stands for Technology Education and Literacy in Schools, and I know that it is taking root in San Diego high schools, teaching and building computer science programs. Which brings me to my next point: in times such as these, I think it’s important for public education to expand on the growing technology in the classroom. Though courses such as AP Computer Science and engineering are offered, they are limited in curriculum and resources, particularly in inner cities and poorer neighborhoods.

I understand that many difficulties arise when dealing with technology: once paperwork has been passed for devices to be purchased, the devices may be out of date -- for example, iPads. Though they seemed useful as I was in freshman year, now, those iPads sit unused.

I hope to see opportunities like TEALS and Khan Academy incorporated into future curriculum and classrooms for California students. I understand that legislation reform and bureaucracy are substantial obstacles to overcome: to keep education in its top form, there requires continual reform and revamping of classrooms and curriculum. Unfortunately, this flexible dynamic is not the most compatible with the current structure of the government. Changes are often slow in our bureaucracy. This is why outside, private organizations can be so useful in government school systems. There are many private organizations, especially in San Diego, that strive to help public schools.

Working with large, corporate-sponsored philanthropic groups such as TEALS can potentially bolster the staggering lack of technology and technology-education in California schools. When the future accelerates towards a digitalized world, average public school students are left behind without the chance to understand and work with such technologies on their own.  

With that being said, I’d also like to praise the California Department of Education for the progress that’s been made in the last few years! As a high school student, it’s refreshing to see new curriculum, such as the Next Generation Science Standards, being adopted in our state. Though I’ve yet to experience the coursework firsthand, I do believe that the department is staying true to its mission: to continue reforming and improving public schools for the benefit of students.

To continue carrying out the purpose of the Department of Education, I hope to see progress and the push for continual reform in the future, including several areas of interest that I’ve mentioned above.

As California is a leading state at all levels of education, it would be negligent of us to hesitate in continually striving for better and more useful public education. I sincerely think that the academic gap between income groups requires more recognition and analysis. Though the lack of preparation for standardized testing and the few technological classes offered in schools is common across many public schools, students in more fortunate families have the chance to attend supplemental camps and classes. To ensure that all California students have a relatively equal standing, I believe coordination with outside organizations -- such as Khan Academy or TEALS -- will be most useful, since bureaucracies are less successful when dealing with rapidly advancing technology.

I understand that it is difficult to maintain curriculum relevance in the classroom because of obstacles such as voting on taxes and other legislation. But education is a cornerstone of California and America, and I hope to continue seeing progress in the Department of Education.

Thank you for your time. Although these are some of my worries, I look forward to college as a time for me to grow as a student and as a person. I hope to hear back from you!

Sincerely,

Melba Nuzen