http://www.bbg.org/sci/nymf/index.html

Started in 1990, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden began a rather ambitious project to document the flora in all counties within a 50-mile radius of New York City, including all of Long Island, southeastern New York State, and northern New Jersey. Much of the funding for the project comes from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the New York Community Trust. As part of the public outreach component of this project, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden has created the online metropolitan plant encyclopedia, along with a botanical key to identifying these plants. Visitors can browse through the encyclopedia at their leisure, consult a glossary of terms, and learn more about each species. Additionally, the "What Plants Grow Where" will help users learn which woody plant species grow in any given county within the study area. [KMG]

http://photofiles.lib.uchicago.edu/

Many universities have extensive archives that document their institutions' growth, development and evolution, and the University of Chicago is no exception. Their current archival photo files digitization project began in February 2002, and the first stage was recently completed and made available for the general public on this website. This first set of images to be made available comes from the series titled "Buildings and Grounds". Of course, the photographs and visual materials contained within cover a wide range of subjects, ranging from zoning maps of the surrounding areas in the early 20th century to photographs of various buildings under construction from the 1890s to the 1920s. There are a number of real finds contained within the archives, including a photograph of that legendary educational iconoclast Robert Maynard Hutchins at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Oriental Institute and Enrico Fermi placing a time capsule inside the Accelerator building at the James Franck Institute. [KMG]

http://www.brunerfoundation.org/

The Rudy Bruner Foundation and Award for Urban Excellence was created in 1986 by Simeon Bruner to honor his late father. The award seeks to honor those urban places that "are developed with such vision and imagination that they transform urban problems into creative solutions." The award is given every two years, and one gold medal prize is awarded (along with a $50,000 prize) and several silver medal winners are also awarded. On this site, visitors can learn about previous award winners, such as the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, the Camino Nuevo Charter Academy, and the Pike Place Market. Additionally, the Bruner Foundation makes a number of its publications available online, including compilations of materials about the winning places from 1991 to 2003. [KMG]

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/03cius.htm

Every year, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) produces its annual complete crime report for the United States, and the report for 2003 was recently made available in a variety of formats on the agency's website. While the report is a bit overwhelming (it is 516 pages in length), novice users may want to start by looking at page v, which explains how to read and understand the numbers contained within the report. Section II contains details on all offenses reported, including violent crime, property crime, and hate crime. In brief, the report reveals that violent crime in the United States dropped three percent last year, and that 62 percent of last year's murders have been solved to date. It is also worth noting that during the past 10 years, total violent crime in the U.S. has dropped 25 percent. A number of separate tables are available in the Excel format, including "Murder Victims by Age, by Weapon" and "Arrests by State". [KMG]

http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v12n42/v12n42.pdf

The Education Policy Analysis Archives is well regarded for its peer-reviewed articles that deal with a broad range of topics related to education policy, ranging from articles on college graduation rates to developing culturally sensitive teaching materials. One of the most recent articles will be of great interest to those with an interest in the problem of teacher turnover and attrition in urban elementary schools. This 30-page paper from August 2004 was authored by Kacey Guin, a researcher at the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington. The study presented here examines the "characteristics of elementary schools that experience chronic teacher turnover" and also makes several interesting policy suggestions, including the contention that school districts should provide effective incentive programs so that high quality teachers will remain in low-performing schools. [KMG]

http://www.science-groove.org/MASSIVE/

Math And Science Song Information, Viewable Everywhere, or MASSIVE, is a database containing information on more than 1700 science and math songs. The songs, suitable for a variety of ages and of varying sound quality, are both silly and serious. Visitors can search on a song or listen to MASSIVE radio, "an Internet radio station devoted entirely to science/math songs." (Note that the radio station requires a connection speed of at least 64 kilobits per second). The database includes the name of the performer, songwriter, the album title, lyrics, and links to sample files along with purchasing information. The database is maintained by Greg Crowther, who is affiliated with the University of Washington, Science Groove, and the Science Songwriters' Association. The project is part of the National Science Foundation's National Science Digital Library. [VF] This site is also reviewed in the November 5, 2004 NSDL MET Report. [VF]

http://www.pacificshipwrecks.ca/english/index.html

For those who make their living aboard large ships, there is always the fear of a potential shipwreck, especially when navigating dangerous passages. One of the latest sites from the Virtual Museum of Canada explores the various shipwrecks that have taken place around Vancouver Island, off the mainland of British Columbia, from the year 1803 to the present day. Here visitors will learn about the tales of survival from these doomed vessels, view an interactive map of the shipwrecks, and learn about the various hazards associated with the waters off Vancouver Island. The tales of survival are told in 10 stories disseminated through the site's own "Shipwreck Times", which takes quotes from interviews and historic newspaper articles to create a full portrait of each incident. The interactive shipwreck map is quite nice, as it allows visitors to learn about each shipwreck and to view photographs of the various wrecks in context. There is also an interactive game called "Wrecks", that allows visitors to navigate the icy oceans of Vancouver Island in an attempt to bring their cargo to a safe harbor. [KMG]

http://www.japansociety.org

The Japan Society was founded in New York City in 1907 by a group of businesspeople who were intimately interested in promoting relations between the United States and Japan. While the Society experienced a downturn in activities during World War II, the postwar period saw the Society come under the direction of John D. Rockefeller III, who was able to vastly expand its programs. Currently, the Society offers a number of programs, including programs for K-12 educators, a language center, a global affairs lecture and seminar series, and exhibitions in its gallery. One particularly nice resource is the mini-site, "Journey Through Japan", which may be found in the education section. This part of the site is designed specifically for educators, and includes background readings, lesson plans, maps, an interactive timeline and a photo gallery. Additionally, visitors can sign up to receive a number of specialized electronic newsletters sent out by the Society. [KMG]