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A Kamilaroi woman from Tamworth, a mentor and scientist, Karlie recently became the first Indigenous person in NSW to attain a double degree in science and mathematics.

Karlie has made it her life mission to make STEM accessible to people of all different backgrounds.

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Duke, 30, is a member of the Muscowpetung Nation. He's developing a new augmented reality app—think Pokémon Go—to share Indigenous stories that are tied to physical places like this one. It's called Wikiupedia, and Skwachàys is one of its first geolocations.

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Nitáimixtsinaki, “I Braid,” is a short, wordless comic I made to illustrate and process the experiences of native girl children who have become victims of sexual assault. How do we reconcile our pain with our culture? How do we process the inter-generational trauma? How do wash away the feeling of disappointing our ancestors? It is not our fault, we are not to blame. Our bodies and minds are holy, and together, we can overcome. You are not alone. 

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Toward Transformative Visions for Educational Equity Vossoughi, Hooper, Escudé 2016

... starting points for equity-oriented research and design: critical analyses of educational injustice; historicized approaches to making as cross-cultural activity; explicit attention to pedagogical philosophies and practices; and ongoing inquiry into the sociopolitical values and purposes of making. ...

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We need to set up the same learning environments for our teachers as we wish for our youth. It is vitally important to allow teachers to experiment and relive the feeling of being learners alongside their students, lessen the distance between what it means to be a teacher and a learner, and create multi-developmental learning groups within administration, faculty and student body. In addition, though it’s favorable to make high-end tools like 3D printers accessible to all, it’s disadvantageous to see tools as an answer. Being a maker is a mindset, not a tool.

Making a Platform for Empowerment

By David Wells

(via whatmilesreads)

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Virtual Art Sessions

Google Chrome Experiment presents volumetric video captures of artists using the VR painting app Tiltbrush, which can be viewed in-browser:

Virtual Art Sessions is an experiment in virtual reality painting with Tilt Brush. The project partnered with six world-renowned artists bringing them a new way to paint, draw and sculpt. We recorded their sessions and made it accessible online, letting you observe the artists as they develop their virtual reality creations from any angle.

The project renders high volumes of data right in the browser. This includes point cloud data of the artist’s physical form, 3D geometry data of the artwork, and position data of the VR controllers. Using open source web technologies, we transformed that data into something that can be experienced by anyone using the web. No apps or plug-ins needed.

Virtual Art Sessions is open source. It’s a bit of a mess, so proceed at your own risk, but if you poke around enough, you’ll see how we created the entire project.

Very impressive project - try it out for yourself and find out more here

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Computer science: the impact of K-12 on university enrollment

At Code.org, we’re regularly asked if teaching computer science in grades K-12 will impact university enrollment. Note: our core motivation is for schools to teach computer science as a foundational course, regardless of what a student chooses to major in. But the data is also clear: studying computer science in high school is highly correlated to university enrollment. (source: the College Board)

1. High school AP Computer Science students are twice as likely to try computer science in college than non-AP Computer Science students.  (58% vs 28%)

2. High School AP Computer Science students are 6 times more likely to major in computer science than non-AP Computer Science students (19% vs 3%)

3. Girls and underrepresented minorities are especially more likely to major in CS if they try it in high school

High School girls who take AP Computer Science are 10 times more likely to major in computer science than girls who do not. (11% vs 1%).  African American and Hispanic students who take AP Computer Science in high school are 7-8 times more likely to major in CS than those who do not. (14-17% vs 2%)

- Hadi Partovi, Code.org

Note: It’s important to keep in mind that this data shows correlation, not causation. There’s certainly a selection bias among students who choose to try AP computer science in high school. 

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7 indigenous comics creators you should know about

After a hugely successful Kickstarter campaign that raised nearly $75,000, copies of the graphic novel Moonshot have been sent out to anxious readers across North America. Moonshot is a collection of indigenous comics with 33 contributors, the majority of whom are First Nations, Inuit or Métis.

“I was really excited to showcase these artists and these writers that I’ve heard about and that I’ve seen online who really haven’t had a chance to reach a wider audience,” said Toronto-based editor Hope Nicholson to q guest host Candy Palmater. “I’ve been such a fan of theirs and I wanted everyone else to be too.”

In that spirit, we gave Nicholson the difficult task of selecting a few of her favourite indigenous creators featured in Moonshot, which is available on Amazon.ca and the Moonshot website.

READ MORE AND SEE THE 7 HERE

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The creation story is a spaceship

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Gorgeous side-scrolling game with lots of attention to detail. This review is on point, but I wanted to add that I found the keyboard controls left some to be desired, and the puzzles weren’t always a logical progression. They mostly built on the last skill you learned, like you learn to grab an item and pull it, and next scene is a box you have to pull over so you can climb on it  to reach the next thing. But sometimes the next step was really unclear and I was left alternating characters, throwing the bola and jumping around trying to find some combination that caused something else to happen with no progress. I died a lot. It’s pretty straightforward, so I’d appreciate some kind of hint option when it isn’t obvious. I was also a little confused about how to save the game and lost my place several times, ending up at the last checkpoint which was quite a way back. These might just be newbie problems, but I feel like this game should be accessible to even non-game-players.

In terms of community-led projects, they got this right. The world is built with a lot of care and insight without being heavy-handed, and I am very happy it is all Iñupiat language. The planning and consultation can, and generally should, be a very long process with lots of iterations and reviews, but this can also be a project killer if it reaches the point of fatigue. The concept was fully realized in a stellar way, but now it’s ready for some more focus on game play.

Earlier this year, we took on Never Alone and “World Games” (spoilers: it was a great success). This interesting mini-documentary created for the Future of Storytelling Summit sheds additional light on Never Alone’s development and what it means to work with communities to create a “World Game”. (via Kill Screen)

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Digital Cultural Maps

Mapping Indigenous LA

story maps and spatial maps of indigenous peoples in Los Angeles

http://mila.ss.ucla.edu/

The Ways

(Great Lakes Culture and Language) uses both story maps (narrative) and spatial maps, and it has a sleek design.

http://theways.org/

Voices on the Land

is curated as tours, and is spatially-oriented on an overhead-view map with less media content.

http://voicesontheland.org

Burke Museum’s Waterlines

shows historic waterways and shorelines along with human presence. It uses Flash. There is also a lovely printed map available (http://www.burkemuseum.org/waterlines/project_map.html).

http://www.burkemuseum.org/waterlines/

Lkóot -Jilkáat Storyboard

is an interactive touch-table program at the Haines Borough Library in Alaska. Most of the content is available online in this interface also, though interacting with the table is much more compelling.

https://cvstoryboard.org/

http://www.haineslibrary.org/l%E1%B8%B5%C3%B3ot-jil%E1%B8%B5%C3%A1at-storyboard