If you are looking for inspiration, this is a good place to start. It definitely helped me.

Thankfully, nobody was injured. Amazing that although we are as technologically advanced as we are, mother nature still has a few tricks up her sleeve.

Many of you have come to know me through my Nomadic Learning blog. Initially I had intended to use it as a way to share my thoughts surrounding life, my family and my travels. I also figured that while I was at it, I could use it as a portfolio to showcase some of my work and technology related experiments. For almost 9-months that is exactly how I kept it and it wasn’t until I attended the ASAE Technology Conference in February of this year that things started to change.

It was at that point that I not only found additional topics to write about, but I also discovered a network of like-minded individuals (The Association Blogoclump) who were also interested in similar topics and were passionate about sharing their thoughts. At that point I tried to maintain my blog as dual-purpose, but I quickly realized that similar to my actual life, separating what is personal from professional online is not an easy thing to do.

I really do love my family and know that there is more than enough material that I could share in a blog format. My family and I have the opportunity to do a lot of really fun things together. And with a toddler in the house, there is never a shortage of activity to write about and share pictures of. However, I am also extremely passionate about the association that I work for, the work that I do, and talking about the intersection of technology, learning and associations. While I am not able to discuss many of the specifics of my day-to-day work, I have been able to share my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences in more of a general manner pretty regularly since I started blogging about it.

A few weeks ago, my son and I accompanied my wife on a trip to a conference in Detroit she was attending. It was at that point when I realized the true challenge of blogging about professional activities and personal life in the same venue. During the time that we spent in Detroit my son and I made many memories (visiting Comerica Park and Ford Field, attending the Detroit Autorama, etc.) but I really didn’t feel it was appropriate the share those pictures with folks who read my blog for thoughts and ideas related to technology and associations.

Shortly after I returned from the trip, I put a considerable amount of time and energy into rethinking my entire blogging strategy. Could I separate my personal life and professional life and still have enough energy and enthusiasm to write about both, while giving 100% to my family and my job? How would the separate impact (positive or negative) those who have become regular readers? Would I lose the results of all of the work I have put into building and establishing my blog as a source of relevant, reliable and hopefully mildly informative and entertaining materials? What do I do with all of the legacy content related to one blog but not the other. Could I make the transition seamless? Was this the beginning of the end or just a new beginning?

These thoughts plagued my mind as I struggled with the decision. As an added impact, my posting and blog reading dwindled to nearly nothing. I knew that I had to be fully committed to whatever decision I made, so I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to weigh all of the variables. Finally, I knew that I was starting to suffer from “analysis-paralysis” and needed to simply make a decision. The answer to my question seemed to be in front of me from the beginning…I wanted to be focused and dedicated to both my personal life and my professional life therefore that kind of focus requires separation. And separation requires a new blog to handle my professional side so I can return this blog to things more personal to me.

For the past two weeks I have been spending all of my time getting my act together. As anyone knows who has set up their own blog it’s a time consuming process. Fortunately for me I am intimately familiar with WordPress and have set-up a number of blogs for family, friends and colleagues and know the platform pretty intimately. There is certainly much that I still have to learn about it, but I know how to get a new WP Blog up and running quickly and the making customizations are getting easier too.

Knowing that the technology was only half of the battle I also had to come up with not only a new domain name but also an entirely new look and feel in order to achieve complete separation. As fate and luck would have it both fell into place relatively easily. While I won’t go into the specifics of how I chose my new blog name (good material for a future post), lets just say that I wanted it to be easy to remember, specific enough to address the topics that I will be discussing, and vague enough to allow me to post about the things I am passionate about but not niche me too far into one specific topic.

Since I want to focus on topics related to learning, community, leadership, and technology and I wanted it to be specific to the association world, I knew I had my work cut out for me. The net-result is my new blog name (Associated Knowledge) and corresponding domain name (http://www.associatedknowledge.com). Sure it is longer than the domain-naming experts recommend but I think it will be very easy to remember, so the compromise was easy to make.

The other challenge I had to face was the look and feel of the blog. This site was designed specifically for my friends and family and to be quite honest it was more about what I wanted than what a broader audience would want. And while I did focus on some of the usability / findability aspects in the initial design, I didn’t put that at the forefront of my work. What This translates into is a site that is standards compliant, visually attractive by many standards, but somewhat difficult to use and navigate. It also places too much focus on me and not enough on what I am writing.

I knew much of this had to change for my new site, especially if I wanted to hold on to my current readers, attract new ones and keep the site useful for everyone. This translated into a lengthy search for a theme that met my usability and information architecture needs but also was very unique. Quite honestly it wasn’t an easy task. While one of the greatest strengths of WordPress is the fact that so many themes do exist for it, many are simply not up to the task of supporting all of my specific needs, and those that were also happened to be in wide use and therefore were not unique.

Again, through a stroke of luck I came across a really talented developer by the name of Brian Gardner who has developed a number of really nice WP themes and also runs his own design company. He also had a pretty unmistakable blog of his own with a design that I really liked so I reached out to him. After discussing my needs we were able to strike a deal that secured me a pretty unique design and benefited Brian as well. Granted all I really received was the structural elements, I still had to change the look and feel to my liking, but it was considerably easier than starting from scratch.

After many hours spent under the hood of WordPress and working in Fireworks, I was able to customize the theme and give it a unique and hopefully a memorable design. I also worked to enhance the user-experience through the use of social-networking tools, feeds, and easy navigation. While it is very much a work in progress, I am quite pleased with the results.

So to come full-circle on my initial question: is it possible to separate personal from professional? Well my experience was largely about blogging, but it is also metaphorical because it required me to take a look at both spheres of my life and determine what was important. What I found throughout the process is that I do love being a family-man but I am also very passionate about my work. However, to be fair to both some level of separation needs to be established. For me it means separating my personal blog from my professional blog and it also means being an association professional and technologist at work and being a husband, daddy, son, brother and friend at home.

Separation is possible but it isn’t easy and does require focus, dedication, and perseverance. And while there are no guarantees, I am hopeful and optimistic given the rather auspicious start I have enjoyed. Again as a friendly reminder please update any bookmarks or link to this site to http://www.associatedknowledge.com and update any feeds as well.

Despite what Time magazine would have you believe, you are not the most powerful or influential person on the Web. At PC World we love online personals, social networks, and videos of people falling on their keisters as much as the next person, but without the folks who create the Craigslists, MySpaces, and YouTubes of the world, much of the Web’s potential would be lost among spam sites and other online detritus.

The 50 Most Important People on the Web | PC World

Just as employers are figuring out the role of blogs, their value and downside, along come wikis. Actually, wikis have been around for quite some time, but experts say it’s just now that mainstream employers are starting to tap into the power of such Web sites - where users can add and edit content at will - as a means of collecting employee knowledge and enhancing productivity.

Even as the research firm Gartner Inc., based in Stamford, Conn., is predicting that by 2009 half of companies worldwide will be using wikis, employers ranging from investment banks to book publishers to nonprofits are using them in a variety of ways:

It’s information collaboration | Newsday

Viacom Inks Video Deal with ‘YouTube Killer’ Joost | Sci-Tech Today

“All children develop a belief about their own intelligence. Some students start thinking of their intelligence as something fixed, as carved in stone. They worry about, ‘Do I have enough? Don’t I have enough?’”

Dweck went onto explore questions such as: “whether a child’s belief about intelligence has anything to do with academic success”. After successfully answering that question: it does, she went on to partner with Lisa Blackwell, from Columbia University to delve into the topic more thoroughly. They wanted to know: “If we gave students a growth mindset, if we taught them how to think about their intelligence, would that benefit their grades?”

Again, the answer was yes.

Now I am definitely an educator through-and-through and feel that anything that helps teachers provide students with tools they can use to increase or realize their potential is a very positive contribution, but I can’t help but feel that this study appears to be a case of science proving the obvious.

I am not trying to say that I had already thought of the idea, but it did seem to be an underlying theme in my graduate education. Truthfully, it doesn’t appear to be too different (at least from my perspective) than the widely referenced Pygmalion effect (also known as the Rosenthal effect or the teacher-expectancy effect) which essentially states that students that are held to higher expectations by their teachers will perform better than students who are not.

Now it isn’t a direct correlation, but I believe the premise is the same. If one is held to a set of expectations (good or bad) or one has a certain belief (good or bad) that result will generally be realized. It only stands to reason that if you spend time with students and not only teach them that they are capable of achieving whatever they set their minds to, and simultaneously show them that you believe in them, they will achieve it.

In fact I believe it was Napoleon Hill who is quoted as saying: “What the mind of man can conceive and believe, It can achieve.”

Again, I am not trying to find fault with the results of the study because the concept may have previously been more anecdotal as opposed to research-based, and therefore less likely to be supported. By taking the time to examine the idea more exhaustively, the Dweck and Blackwell were able to validate it and make it far more likely to see wide-spread use in classrooms worldwide. Everybody wins because of their work…and that is a good thing.

I do have one question revolving around the generalizability of the findings. The core of the study appears to be based on middle school students in a general education setting. Personally, I would love to know if the results would be applicable and validate for at-risk students, students with special needs and even adult learners. My experience with these populations tells me that it would, but again that is only my opinion. It’s obvious that this study could pave the way for some additional, potentially breakthrough, research.

Employers Embrace E-Learning | Silicon.com

A forecast model is a complex computer programs that is run on supercomputers and provide predictions on many atmospheric variables such as temperature, pressure, wind, and rainfall. A forecaster examines how the features predicted by the computer will interact to produce the day’s weather. Each model has it adherents based on its known strengths, biases, and track record and no one model is used to predict the weather forecast by any of the agencies listed above. To get an idea of all of the different models, take a look at the Penn State University Weather Wall which provides a pretty good look at many of them and their resultant data.

Depending on your source for weather there are significant differences in what forecast you will receive. I consider myself to be somewhat of a weather zealot (someone who has an above average understanding of meteorology and forecasting and doesn’t necessarily trust weather provided by typical consumer outlets, but is in no way a trained meteorologist) and therefore immediately discount TV weather forecasts and the like. Even for folks with less of a scientific interest in the weather but who would still like an accurate forecast to plan their days activities the source makes all of the difference and trust me, there is a difference.

I digress. So, as I have watched the interpretations of the forecast come in on Sunday and early this morning, I have noticed yet another battle being waged between the models and the meteorologists. As is the case time and time again, the models provide an initial solution and change with every given run (generally forecast models are run on fixed intervals to all the models the ability to factor in new data) and the forecasters are left with a decision: trust the models or trust their instincts.

Saturday (10 February 2007) and yesterday morning (Sunday, 11 Februrary 2007) there was pretty widespread agreement that the “Valentines Day” storm would yield a significant all snow event for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. This gave many meteorologists the confidence to issue initial forecasts that cranked up the snow amounts for these areas. However, as the day (and model runs) progressed, many of the forecasters began to change their tune. The new solution developed the primary low pressure system (responsible for bad weather) further west and further south and as a result developed the secondary low pressure system closer to the coast which would allow warm air to infiltrate. The net-result of this shift took an all snow event for much of the area referenced above and changed it to an all snow event inland and a mix along the coast up the I-95 corridor for the big cities. One of the first groups of meteorologists who jumped on this bandwaggon was the NWS and slowly a few others followed.

Yet while the models were saying one thing others stuck to their guns and felt that the model runs didn’t factor in things like how cold the air is coming down from Canada thereby affecting where the actual low-pressure system actually forms which in turn would determine who gets a lot of snow, who gets a mix and ultimately where the line of demarcation is between the two. Rest assured all you snow lovers out there, all of the forecast sources I have been watching still think it will be a good storm, but the deviations between each forecast call into question the amount of snow that will actually fall and who will be impacted the most.

My reason for calling this into question is pretty simple. Who do you trust? Do you trust forecasters and agencies who rely heavily on the forecast models to make their predictions, do you rely on those who use a combination of the models and their judgment, or do you trust those who are willing to throw the models out and rely on their past experience and understanding of all of the dynamics that are at play? For the upcoming storm, this appears to be the $100k question.

Personally, I think I trust the latter as opposed to the former. Sure I am a technologist who relies on the power of computers every given day, but at the same time, being a true technologists also requires an acknogledgement that computers simply don’t know everything. It becomes a case of GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). To turn the situation to something more personal, I would much rather go to a doctor who allows me to self-diagnose and uses his/her knowledge and experience in the medical field, than one that relies completely on hard science to make a diagnosis.

I respect scientists and the work that they do, but somewhere in the mix science has to give way to expert judgment. Science only gets you so far…it provides a key to the door, but ultimately how that key is used and what door the key is used on really do matter. I suspect this is the case with the upcoming forecast (and any forecast for that matter). As with the case with many things in life, only time will tell, but for the upcoming storm, I am sticking with the forecasters who aren’t afraid to deviate from the norm and trust their gut.

Here is a forecast map with predicted amounts of snow for the affected areas that was complied by Accuweather.com ’s Senior Meterologist and Severe Weather Expert Henry Margusity :

Finally, here is Henry’s predictions with regard to how much snow specific cities in the stroms path could get. In all fairness to Henry, these were posted Saturday evening and are obviously his best guess based on the information he had available at the time.

Take notice to the specific predictions for Allentown, Philadelphia and Washington, DC. I highlighted these areas because a few colleagues and myself are supposed to be travelling to a conference in DC tomorrow afternoon that runs through Valentines Day (February 14th). Obviously, if these amounts are even close to accurate (which I fear they are), it is going to make for a pretty memorable experience should we decide to go.

I will offer one counterpoint, which I think is important to have when one is dealing with the weather. Elliot Abrams, Expert Senior Meterologist at Accuweather.com offers a word of caution.

Remember how models at first showed the storm farther south? Well the models yesterday trended north to suggest the area from Maryland to Maine could get heavy snow. However, suppose the trend of the models toward a more northerly track continues? Then, warm air that would have stayed south of places like Philadelphia and New York City would actually encroach northward and change the snow to rain at the height of the storm.

I don’t think it’s time to write off a giant storm just yet, but I believe too many people get caught up in “snow fever” and forget that storms of this size and nature are rather unpredictable despite the advanced technology we use to forecast them. In the end, I guess it is better to hope for the best (in this case I really want a big storm) and prepare for the worst (in this situation a snow to rain transition or a total miss). Stay tuned, I am going to keep on top of this one because I think it could be a storm to remember.