Robin DeRosa

Director of Learning & Libraries at a regional public university in New Hampshire, USA; Director of Open Learning & Teaching Collaborative; public higher ed advocate; Interests in: open pedagogy, critical higher ed studies, being human in inhumane environments

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npub19njd3z2zz9tqq9j59ln4d4rjxgsqqk709ag48m7vqvy6f74lz40sn04zj8

NIP-05 Address

actualham_at_social.coop@mostr.pub

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npub19njd3z2zz9tqq9j59ln4d4rjxgsqqk709ag48m7vqvy6f74lz40sn04zj8

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Last Notes

2025-04-05 17:36:46

Happy to be with a HUGE group of fed-up New Hampshirites at the State House today. The crowds ultimately crossed the whole lawn and both sides of the street for blocks. #HandsOff
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2024-10-06 23:32:27

I showed up at my kiddo’s gig in Providence to surprise them (I am in town ahead of the Open Ed conference). I got my noise canceling headphones but I am not sure that will be enough!!!! I am going to try to stay away from the mosh pit!!!! Do not mosh me!!!! I have an artificial hip!!!!
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2024-09-09 16:57:17

I will be giving a free webinar on Thursday open to faculty and staff at all Wisconsin public colleges and universities: "Framing This Moment: Teaching & Learning in Universities Under Attack." Please register and share with your WI colleagues https://www.wisconsin.edu/opid/opid-webinar-series-2024-25/
#HigherEd #neoliberalism #pedagogy #wisconsin

2024-09-03 12:52:02

You know what would immediately solve the budget crisis at my rural state university? Having the state support more than its current 9% of our operating budget. Allocate like 25% and we'd be completely flush.
So fuck right off with your innovation lean rightsizing 21st century bullshit and fund YOUR DAMN SCHOOL.

2024-08-20 00:20:37

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But still. I’ll cast a vote for Harris with enormous relief that I can vote against a brazen fascist. With hope that the centering of Black women’s voices and power will help pull our country in a better direction. With gratitude that at least some of my values—about women’s bodily autonomy, about climate change, about income inequality—are reflected in the current Democratic platform.

2024-08-20 00:16:41

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I’d be much more at home on the sidewalk outside the DNC pushing the dems to acknowledge the genocide in Gaza, the corruptness of the big money in our democratic process, the propping up of our deeply racist, carceral, and surveillant nation that the Dems have not only supported but championed.

2024-08-20 00:13:35

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But take a look at the values that propel the people who show up at these conventions. Look at the superstars who emerge not from the corporate machines of the national committees, but out of their own charismatic representation of their journeys and hopes. Look at your own dreams and then tell me that both of these parties give voice to them—or pervert them—in just the same ways.

2024-08-20 00:10:19

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I do indeed think that neoliberalism is the common thread that undergirds both of these mainstream parties, and there are so many direct pathways from neoliberalism to fascism. So I get that we need to call that out across both of these parties.

2024-08-20 00:08:42

I am a longtime critic of the Dems, and I am far to the left of the party as a whole. I share most of the positions of the many protesters outside the DNC right now. That being said, the idea that someone could watch the RNC and the DNC and say there is “no difference” between these parties is infuriating to me. The policy positions, tone, lead voices, central values—they are vastly different. (1/n)

2024-07-23 00:26:21

28% of Gen Z identify as LGBTQ+
21% of Gen Z identify as Republican

2024-06-26 00:02:59

What a fucking horrible thing to labor under these conditions. I’m so sorry for all of us in #higherEd.
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2024-06-24 19:38:03

This seems legit and I plan to try when I get back to my computer.
“11 steps to keep Meta from stealing your data to train AI: You only have until June 26, 2024 to say no to Meta taking your personal photos and words and using them to train their generative AI. Here are step-by-step directions for opting out.”
https://deborahcopaken.substack.com/p/11-steps-to-opt-out-of-metas-data

2024-06-23 16:07:51

"Nationally, as many as half of students whose campuses close don’t resume their studies, according to the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association, whose data surveys both nonprofit and for-profit schools, including two-year colleges."
When colleges close, students are left scrambling. Some never go back to school https://www.fox43.com/article/news/education/colleges-close-students-school-university--arts-philadelphia/521-e4eca288-1568-44fc-81e8-9fc57d339111
#HigherEd

2024-05-11 02:44:24

Arora off my back porch this evening in New Hampshire!
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2024-04-30 13:25:50

This Teen Vogue op-ed argues that university boards are really in control of many core functions on college and university campuses. https://www.teenvogue.com/story/campus-cancel-culture-university-boards

2024-04-18 12:30:05

Kids Don’t Need to Get Sick To Be Healthy https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/kids-dont-need-to-get-sick-to-be

2024-02-29 14:16:18

"Austerity is always a *policy choice* — it is not inevitable. These cuts and academic program reviews are not 'best practices for running a university,' as one of the senior officials at my own college called them — they’re mechanisms of neoliberalism." https://www.leftvoice.org/u-s-higher-education-is-being-gutted-but-we-can-fight-it/
#HigherEd

2024-01-24 16:57:24

"The story of the Moderna vaccine isn't one of a company taking huge gambles with shareholder dollars. It's the story of the US government giving billions and billions of dollars to a private firm, which will now *charge* the US government – and the American people – a 4,460% markup on the resulting medicine." https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/25/nationalize-moderna/#herd-immunity #covid

2024-01-10 19:24:26

This is so, so good: "AI machines aren’t ‘hallucinating’. But their makers are" by Naomi Klein
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/08/ai-machines-hallucinating-naomi-klein

2023-12-19 16:12:31

There is huge flooding in my neck of the woods in New England. Schools are closed. Last time this happened a decade ago, my feeds were full of pictures and disaster drama. This time, it's like we are so used to every day bringing another disaster, that when big ones hit, the effects are almost muted. People just sort of blink and go on. I am sorry we are all so trampled by this world that we have engineered that we have made this pitiful peace with the daily apocalypses.

2023-12-16 00:03:20

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Cc @npub13vv…0sze in case you’d like to boost it!

2023-12-10 16:03:04

Hey, amazing PLN! A challenge for ya! We are renaming a core course in our undergrad customized major curriculum. It's a half-term course focused on guiding students toward developing (enjoying! insisting on!) more autonomy as learners. It's core to our program but open to all undergrads. No prereqs. We need an appealing, accessible title. The course is a winner, but the current title (niche to our college but still opaque to our students) is a loser. HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST IDEAS! Please share!

2023-11-11 22:51:53

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@npub1u27…3qfq @npub1psd…9sr7 cc @npub1zw6…3t7c

2023-11-02 00:02:24

Two indications that I am aging. 1) No amount of pain medication can soothe my beleaguered hip. 2) I am gradually downsizing my wardrobe and soon I will only only own like three outfits, all fully made of hemp.

2023-10-28 13:14:46

This is atrocious.
While Conservative PragerU sought state approval, NH Education Commissioner provided support behind the scenes https://www.nhpr.org/nh-news/2023-10-06/while-prageru-sought-state-approval-education-commissioner-provided-support-behind-the-scenes
#NHPolitics

2023-10-25 13:17:47

Texas book ban sweeps the state as new law goes into effect https://paisano-online.com/36972/news/texas-book-ban-sweeps-the-state-as-new-law-goes-into-effect/
#FreeSpeech #FreedomToRead #Library

2023-09-22 23:55:45

The birders staying at this rooming house are in the common room now going through The Bird List. Their leader is calling out every bird they have seen on this trip. It’s been going for so long! Sixteen kinds of warblers alone! The dark-eyed junco was back this year! So much joy! And yet they didn’t see the northern mockingbird and everyone falls silent for a moment, heads bowed.

2023-09-05 13:09:09

"Is College Still Worth the High Price? Weighing Costs and Benefits of Investing in Human Capital"
(Spoiler Alert: "the data suggest it is still one of the best investments a person can make.")
https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/page1-econ/2023/09/01/is-college-still-worth-the-high-price-weighing-costs-and-benefits-of-investing-in-human-capital #HigherEd

2023-08-25 14:06:42

Community college is now free for Mass. residents 25 and older. Millions qualify
https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/08/24/healey-massachusetts-massreconnect-higher-education-cost-free-students
#HigherEd

2023-08-19 13:58:42

Horrifying.
University of Houston students brace for LGBTQ Resource Center closure in response to Texas’ DEI ban: The announcement confronted students with the impact of a new law that will require all state-funded colleges and universities to close their diversity, equity and inclusion offices.
https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/17/university-houston-lgbtq-center-dei-ban/

2023-07-29 02:16:14

Public school district in Texas to eliminate librarians, turn some libraries into discipline centers at 28 campuses https://www.click2houston.com/news/local/2023/07/26/hisd-to-eliminate-librarians-turn-libraries-into-discipline-centers-at-28-campuses/

2023-07-20 16:29:28

My kiddo and I started this campaign to help her significant other, who is facing some very difficult family struggles that have left them homeless (they are staying with us this summer), get back to college in the fall. It's a terrible band-aid on the college affordability crisis, but we have exhausted all our options. If you have a few bucks to spare, we are slowly getting there, and making a huge difference to a kid who deserves this and more. https://www.gofundme.com/manage/help-a-homeless-kid-go-back-to-college #homelessness #higherEd

2023-06-21 16:53:00

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@npub1ahr…m294 @npub12d2…r33x Thanks for explaining. Interesting to consider IHE paywalled only based on whether you hit the paywall based on your own useage.... (I think I would tend to see it as a paywalled source in general if I were inclined to see it as paywalled after I accessed my non-subscriber articles.) But good to know in advance why I will get the block!

2023-06-21 13:58:20

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@npub1ahr…m294 @npub12d2…r33x I am curious about your note about blocking. Are you saying you will block ME if you click an IHE link and you have already expended your free reads? So whether or not you block me depends on how many IHE articles you have clicked in a given month? I am obviously not critiquing anyone's choice of who or how or when to block. Just trying to understand your approach.

2023-06-21 12:31:37

So much of the grotesque horror outlined in this piece reminds me of what my dear friend @npub12d2…r33x said about similar companies (publishers talking about the textbook affordability crisis) who cast #HigherEd aspersions and then coveniently marketing solutions that produce more problems: "it's like leasing a fire extinguisher from a serial arsonist." https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/blogs/online-trending-now/2023/06/21/building-new-model-teaching-and-learning
#personalizedLearning #edTech #AI #OpenAI #ChatGPT

2023-06-14 12:31:00

I have a chapter in this forthcoming book, Higher Education for Good, and it's the project I am most proud of so far in my career. Most proud of, but also most grateful for-- the work in this book will help me persevere with hope and generosity even when the contexts that surround me feel (are) bleak and dangerous. https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0363 #HigherEd #HE4G #OpenAccess #OA @npub1w65…l2uq @npub14lv…zya4

2023-06-11 14:40:46

90% of 2023 graduates think college is really worth it. Here’s why they’re right–and politicians and pundits are wrong https://fortune.com/2023/06/09/90-of-2023-graduates-think-college-is-really-worth-it-heres-why-theyre-right-and-politicians-and-pundits-are-wrong/ #HigherEd

2023-05-22 12:07:42

My beautiful, generous mom has died. She was my person. My heart. My first phone call with any news I had to share, my last phone call every night. She died peacefully in my arms. Everything I am is because of her. The grief is engulfing but mostly what I feel is waves of gratitude like I’ve never felt before for all the ways she made and makes my life as blessed as it is.
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