What skills do people need to survive in the 21st century? It's a great question and one that is examined in painstaking detail by the authors of this 242-page report published by the National Academies Press. Released in 2012, the report responds to a charge from the National Research Council to define the set of key skills that are referenced by the labels "deeper learning, "21st century...

For young people, mathematics can be terribly frightening, boring, or confusing. It can be hard to break through to individuals who may have had a difficult first experience with the subject. That's why Professor Patrick Bahls of the University of North Carolina, Asheville decided to try something a bit different. In the fall of 2007, he began to have math students write short poems offering some...